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"he  New  Testament 


GOODSPEED 


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THE  LIBRARY 
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THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


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The  University  of  Chicago  Publications 
in  Religious  Education 

EDITED  BY 

ERNEST  D.  BURTON  SHAILER  MATHEWS 

THEODORE  G.  SOARES 


HANDBOOKS  OF  ETHICS  AND  RELIGION 


This  series  of  Handbooks  is  intended  to  set  forth  in  a 
readable  form  the  results  of  the  scientific  study  of  religion 
and  ethics.  The  various  authors  do  not  undertake  to  em- 
body in  any  detail  the  processes  which  lie  back  of  their 
conclusions.  Such  technical  treatment  is  more  appropri- 
ate for  works  of  a  strictly  scientific  character  than  for  those 
intended  not  only  to  be  used  as  textbooks  and  collateral 
reading  in  colleges  and  theological  seminaries,  but  also  to 
be  of  help  to  general  readers.  The  volumes  all  seek  to  con- 
serve the  values  of  past  religious  experience.  While  each 
author  is  free  to  present  his  own  conclusions,  the  entire 
series  has  the  common  characteristic  of  historical  method. 
The  editors  have  not  prescribed  any  rigorous  uniformity  of 
treatment,  but  believe  tliat  the  individuality  of  treatment  will 
serve  to  stimulate  thought  and  discussion.  It  is  hoped  that 
the  series  will  help  to  show  that  the  method  of  experiment 
and  criticism  contributes  to  stronger  religious  faith  and 
moral  idealism. — The  Editors. 


THE  STORY  OF  THE  NEW 

TESTAMENT 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OP  CHICAGO  PRESS 
CHICAGO.  ILLINOIS 


THE  BAKER  AND  TAYLOR  COMPANY 
mw  TORS 

THE  CAMBRIDGE  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 
IiOBDOl 

THE  MARUZEN-KABUSHIKI-KAISHA 
toeto,  osiii,  iToro,  fviuoia,  siron 

THE  MISSION  BOOK  COMPANY 


THE 

STORY  OF  THE  NEW 

TESTAMENT 


By 
EDGAR  J.  GOODSPEED 

Professor  of  Biblical  and  Patristic  Greek  in 
The  University  of  Chicago 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CHICAGO  PRESS 
CHICAGO,  ILLINOIS 


Copyright  1916  By 
The  University  of  Chicago 


All  Rights  Reserved 


Published  May  191 6 

Second  Impression  October  1916 

Third  Impression  February  1918 

Fourth  Impression  March  191 8 

Fifth  Impression  October  1919 

Sixth  Impression  June  19*1 

Seventh  Impression  September  1922 

Eighth  Impression  July  1923 

Ninth  Impression  April  1924 

Tenth  Impression  January  1925 

Eleventh  Impression  April  192s 

Twelfth  Impression  November  1925 


Compose!  and  Printed  By 

The  University  of  Chicago  Press 

Chicago,  Illinois.  U.S.A. 


INTRODUCTION 

It  must  always  be  remembered  that  Christianity 
did  not  spring  from  the  New  Testament  but  the 
New  Testament  from  Christianity.  Christianity 
did  not  begin  as  a  religion  of  books  but  as  a  religion 
of  spirit.  There  was  neither  time  nor  need  to 
write  books  when  the  Lord  Jesus  was  at  the  very 
doors.  Still  less  was  there  need  of  authoritative 
books  to  guide  men  whose  dominant  conviction 
was  that  they  had  the  Mind  of  Christ,  the  very 
Spirit  of  God,  guiding  them  constantly  from  within. 

But  the  ancient  Christians  did  write.  Situations 
arose  that  drew  letters  from  them — letters  of  ac- 
knowledgment, thanks,  criticism,  recommendation, 
instruction,  or  advice.  These  letters,  like  our  mod- 
ern letters,  were  written  to  serve  an  immediate  and 
pressing  need.  Situations  arose  which  even  drew 
forth  books  from  these  early  Christians — books  to 
save  people  from  perplexities  or  mistakes,  or  to 
comfort  them  in  anxiety  or  peril ;  but  always  books 
to  serve  some  fairly  definite  circle,  in  a  particular 
condition  of  stress  or  doubt.  This  practical  and 
occasional  character  of  the  books  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment can  hardly  be  overemphasized,  for  it  is  only 
in  the  light  of  the  situations  that  called  them  forth 
that  these  books  can  be  really  understood.  Only 
when  we  put  ourselves  into  the  situation  of  those 

vn 


6452S 


viii  Introduction 

for  whom  a  given  book  of  the  New  Testament  was 
written  do  we  begin  to  feel  our  oneness  with  them 
and  to  find  the  living  worth  in  the  book. 

It  may  be  helpful  to  conceive  the  writings  of  the 
New  Testament  as  grouped  about  four  notable 
events  or  movements:  the  Greek  mission,  that  is, 
the  evangelization  of  the  gentile  world;  the  fall 
of  Jerusalem;  the  persecution  of  Domitian;  and 
the  rise  of  the  early  sects.  The  New  Testament 
shows  us  the  church  first  deep  in  its  missionary 
enterprise,  then  seeking  a  religious  explanation  of 
contemporary  history,  then  bracing  itself  in  the 
midst  of  persecution,  then  plunged  into  controversy 
over  its  own  beliefs. 

The  New  Testament  contains  the  bulk  of  that 
extraordinary  literature  precipitated  by  the  Chris- 
tian movement  in  the  most  interesting  period  of 
its  development.  Christianity  began  its  world- 
career  as  a  hope  of  Jesus'  messianic  return;  it  very 
soon  became  a  permanent  and  organized  church. 
The  books  of  the  New  Testament  show  us  those 
first  eschatological  expectations  gradually  accom- 
modating themselves  to  conditions  of  permanent 

existence. 

The  historical  study  of  the  New  Testament  seeks 
to  trace  this  movement  of  life  and  thought  that 
lies  back  of  the  several  books,  and  to  relate  the 
books  to  this  development.  It  has  yielded  certain 
very  definite  positive  results  which  are  both  inter- 


Introduction  ix 

esting  and  helpful.  Through  it  these  old  books 
recover  something  of  the  power  of  speech,  and 
begin  to  come  to  us  with  the  accent  and  intona- 
tion which  they  had  for  the  readers  for  whom  they 
were  originally  written. 

The  short  chapters  of  this  book  are  designed  to 
present  vividly  and  unconventionally  the  situa- 
tions which  called  forth  the  several  books  or  letters, 
and  the  way  in  which  each  book  or  letter  sought  to 
meet  the  special  situation  to  which  it  was  addressed. 
These  chapters  naturally  owe  much  to  scholars  like 
Burton,  Bacon,  Scott,  McGiffert,  Moffatt,  and 
Harnack,  who  have  done  so  much  for  the  historical 
understanding  of  the  New  Testament.  But  it  is 
hoped  that  a  brief  constructive  presentation  of  the 
background  of  each  book  without  technicality  or 
elaboration  may  bring  back  particularly  to  intel- 
ligent laymen  and  young  people  the  individuality 
and  vital  interest  of  the  writings  of  the  New 
Testament. 

The  purpose  of  this  work  is  threefold:  (i)  The 
book  may  be  used  as  a  basis  for  definite  study  of 
the  New  Testament  individually  or  in  classes. 
The  Suggestions  for  Study  are  prepared  for  this 
purpose.  General  and  special  bibliographies  for 
further  reading  will  be  found  at  the  end  of  the 
book.  The  student  is  advised  not  to  attempt  a 
detailed  investigation  of  specific  parts  of  the  vari- 
ous books,  but  to  seek  to  get  the  large  general  aim 


x  Introduction 

which  controlled  each  individual  writer.  (2)  It 
may  be  read  as  a  continuous  narrative,  without 
regard  to  the  Suggestions  for  Study  at  the  close  of 
each  chapter.  It  will  then  afford  exactly  what  its 
name  implies,  the  story  of  the  New  Testament. 
The  references  to  which  the  occasional  superior 
numerals  relate  will  be  found  at  the  beginning  of 
the  Suggestions  for  Study  which  follow  each  chap- 
ter. (3)  After  each  chapter  the  corresponding  book 
of  the  New  Testament  may  be  read,  preferably  at 
one  sitting,  and  thus  each  piece  of  literature  may 
make  its  own  appeal  on  the  basis  of  the  introduc- 
tory interpretation. 

Edgar  J.  Goodspeed 

Chicago 
November  1,  1915 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PACE 

I.  The  Letters  to  the  Thessalonians      .     .  i 

II.  The  Letter  to  the  Galatians    ....  8 

III.  The  First  Letter  to  the  Cortnthians       .  14 

IV.  The  Second  Letter  to  the  Corinthians   .  20 
V.  The  Letter  to  the  Romans 28 

VI.  The  Letter  to  the  Philippians        ...  35 
VII.  The  Letters  to  Philemon,  to  the  Colos- 

SIANS,  AND  TO  THE  EPHESIANS     ....  41 

VHI.  The  Gospel  According  to  Mark      ...  49 

LX.  The  Gospel  According  to  Matthew    .     .  55 

X.  The  Gospel  According  to  Luke      ...  63 

XI.  The  Acts  of  the  Apostles 70 

XII.  The  Revelation  of  John 75 

XIII.  The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews     ....  85 

XIV.  The  First  Epistle  of  Peter 95 

XV.  The  Epistle  of  James 100 

XVI.  The  Letters  of  John 106 

XVII.  The  Gospel  According  to  John      .     .     .  114 

XVIII.  The  Letters  to  Timothy  and  to  Titus      .  125 

XLX.    The  Epistle  of  Jude  and  the  Second 

Epistle  of  Peter 132 

XX.  The  Making  of  the  New  Testament    .     .  137 

Bibliography 146 

Index 149 


CHAPTER  I 
THE  LETTERS  TO  THE  THESSALONIANS 

About  the  middle  of  the  first  century,  in  the 
Greek  city  of  Corinth,  a  man  sat  down  and  wrote  a 
letter.  He  had  just  received  some  very  cheering 
news  from  friends  of  his,  away  in  the  north,  about 
whom  he  had  been  very  anxious,  and  he  wrote  to 
tell  them  of  his  relief  at  this  news.  As  he  wrote 
or  dictated,  his  feelings  led  him  to  review  his  whole 
acquaintance  with  them,  to  tell  them  about  his 
anxiety  and  how  it  had  been  relieved,  and  to  try 
to  help  them  in  some  of  their  perplexities,  and  be- 
fore he  closed  he  had  written  what  we  should  call  a 
long  letter.  And  this  is  how  our  New  Testament, 
and  indeed  all  Christian  literature,  began.  For  the 
writer  was  Paul,  and  his  friends  were  the  people  at 
Thessalonica  whom  he  had  interested  in  his  doc- 
trine that  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  who  had  been  put  to 
death  in  Jerusalem  twenty  years  before,  was  the 
divine  Messiah,  and  was  to  come  again  to  judge 
the  world. 

Paul  himself  had  believed  this  for  a  long  time, 
and  five  or  six  years  before  he  had  set  out  to  travel 
westward  through  the  Roman  Empire  with  this 
teaching.  At  first  he  had  worked  in  Cyprus  and 
Asia  Minor,  and  it  was  only  a  few  months  before 


2        The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

that  he  with  two  friends  had  crossed  from  Asia 
to  Europe  and  reached  the  soil  of  Greece.    Paul 
was  a  whole-hearted,  loyal  friend,  and  he  doubtless 
made  friends  everywhere  for  himself  and  his  teach- 
ing-    but  he  never  made  quite  such  friends  as 
those  who  had  gathered  around  him  in  these  first 
months  in  Greece.    At  Philippi,  where  he  stopped 
first  and  tried  to  interest  people  in  his  gospel,  his 
friends  made  him  come  and  live  with  them;   and 
they  thought  so  much  of  him  that  then  and  for 
years  afterward  they  sent  him  money  so  that  he 
might  not  have  to  work  at  his  trade  all  the  time 
but  might  have  more  opportunity  to  teach  and 
spread  his  message/    The  Thessalonians  too  had 
become  staunch  friends  of  Paul's.    Some  of  them 
had  risked  their  lives  for  him  when  they  had  known 
him  only  a  few  weeks,  and  others  were  to  stand  by 
him  all  through  his  life  and  to  go  with  him  long 
afterward,  when  he  was  taken,  as  a  prisoner,  from 
Caesarca  to  Rome.    That  was  the  kind  of  people 
in  whom  Paul  had  become  so  interested,  and  to 
whom  he  now  urote  his  letter.    He  had  been  wel- 
comed by  them  when  he  first  came  to  Thessalonica 
and  his  very  success  among  them  had  awakened 
jealousy  and  distrust  on  the  part  of  others.    At 
last  Paul  had  been  obliged  to  leave  the  city  to  pre- 
vent violence  to  himself  and  his  friends.    He  had 
gone  on  westward  along  the  Roman  road  to  Beroea 
and  later  had  turned  south  to  Athens,  but  all  the 


The  Letters  to  the  Thessalonians       3 

ame  he  had  been  anxious  about  his  friends  at  Thes- 
salonica.  What  had  happened  to  them  ?  Had  the 
opposition  of  their  neighbors  made  them  forget  him 
and  give  up  what  he  had  taught  them,  or  were  they 
still  loyal  to  him  and  his  gospel  ?  To  go  back 
and  find  out  would  have  been  perilous  to  him  and 
probably  to  them  also.  So  Paul  had  decided  to 
send  his  young  friend  Timothy  to  seek  them  out 
and  learn  how  matters  stood.  At  the  same  time 
Paul's  other  companion,  Silvanus,  an  older,  more 
experienced  man,  had  been  sent  on  a  similar  errand 
to  the  more  distant  city  of  Philippi,  and  Paul,  left 
all  alone,  had  waited  anxiously,  first  at  Athens  and 
then  at  Corinth,  for  news  to  come. 

When  at  last  it  came,  it  was  good  news."  The 
Thessalonians  had  not  forgotten  Paul.  They  still 
stood  by  him  and  his  gospel,  in  spite  of  all  that 
their  neighbors  were  saying  against  him.  They 
still  held  their  faith  in  Jesus  as  the  divine  Messiah 
and  were  eagerly  waiting  for  his  return  from  heaven, 
to  reward  and  avenge  them;  and  they  were  eager 
to  see  Paul  again.  So  Paul  came  to  write  his  let- 
ter to  them.  He  wanted  to  tell  them  of  his  relief 
and  delight  at  their  faithfulness  and  loyalty,  which 
filled  his  heart  with  gratitude.  He  wished  also  to 
refute  some  charges  against  his  own  work  and  char- 
acter which  people  whom  he  had  antagonized  in 
Thessalonica  had  been  making  against  him.3  Then 
too  Paul  wished  to  tell  his  friends  how  much  he 


4       The  Story  o*  the  New  TiiSrMam 

faul  hoped  to  reach  them,  and  how  when  this  had 

^randtw^ad^t  come  with  his  wel- 
return,  and  How  Paul  saw  ^ 

rome  news.    But  tms  w _  ^ 

0,portunity  to  help '  ^  Tf  ^™  were  troubled 
SW2Ti  fS  who  would,  they  feared 
Ifrvlslhe  joy  and  glory  of  meeting  the  Lord 
T       n  his  re  torn  to  the  earth.    Others  were  per- 
J;3'  ed  abtt  to"  time  of  Jesus'  return,  and  needed 

»i..t  the  time  was  close  at  hand,    borne  neeucu 
that  the  tone  w  insistence  on  punty 

be:emmffi  hnL   of  We     To  aU  thes,  people  Paul 
tt  mfat  o comtort,  counsel,  or  encomage- 
SCent    aTtoeu-  needs  required.     He  was  already 
7  X "JsZ>  work  at  Corinth,  in  some  respects 
^e  most  alsoTbing  and  exacting  he  had  ever  done/ 
Sound ^e  to  keep  in  mind  his  Thes saloman 
Si  and  their  problems,  an t< >  logout ^ 
^em  amid  all  his  istrac ^Uons    t  ^r  nth.^^ 

to  those  with  whom  he  worked. 


The  Letters  to  the  Thessaloneans       5 

We  can  imagine  how  eagerly  the  brethren  at 
Thessalonica  looked  for  Paul's  letter  and  read  and 
reread  it  when  it  came.  They  evidently  put  it 
away  among  their  treasures,  for  that  is  probably 
how  it  came  to  be  preserved  to  us.  They  certainly 
pondered  over  and  discussed  its  contents;  for  be- 
fore many  weeks  had  passed  Paul  had  to  write 
them  again  more  definitely  about  some  of  these 
things.  Something  Paul  had  said  or  written  to 
them,  or  something  they  had  read  in  the  Old 
Testament,  had  made  some  of  them  think  that  the 
Day  of  the  Lord  had  already  come.  Some  of  them 
had  given  up  work,  and  were  content  to  live  in 
religious  contemplation  while  their  richer  or  more 
industrious  brethren  supported  them.  In  their 
idleness  some  of  them  fell  into  unworthy  ways  of 
life  and  became  a  nuisance  and  a  scandal  to  the 
church. 

Paul  was  greatly  stirred  '  y  this.  He  saw  that 
it  threatened  the  good  name  a;; d  the  very  existence 
of  the  church,  and  he  at  once  wrote  them  another 
letter,  our  Second  Thessalonians.  It  was  a  popular 
Jewish  idea  that  in  the  last  days  the  forces  of  evil 
would  find  embodiment  in  an  individual  of  the 
tribe  of  Dan,  who  would  make  an  impious  attack 
upon  God  and  his  people  but  w^uld  fail  and  be 
destroyed  by  the  Messiah.  Paul  in  his  letter  ap- 
peals to  this  idea  and  points  out  that  this  great 
enemy  has  not  yet  appeared  and  so  the  Day  of  the 


6       The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Lord  cannot  have  come.5  There  is  therefore  no 
excuse  for  giving  up  the  ordinary  industry  of  life. 
He  reminds  them  of  a  precept  he  has  given  them 
before:  If  anyone  will  not  work,  give  him  nothing 
to  eat.  Those  who  refuse  to  obey  this  ultimatum 
are  to  be  practically  dropped  from  the  Christian 
fellowship. 

With  these  two  short  letters  Paul  began  Chris- 
tian literature.  Before  he  ceased  to  teach  the 
churches  he  wrote  more  than  one-fourth  of  what 
is  now  included  in  the  New  Testament.  But  in 
these  first  letters  we  see  the  difficulties  that  already 
were  besetting  the  small  new  groups  of  Christians, 
and  the  patience,  skill,  and  boldness  with  which 
their  founder  looked  after  their  development. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR  STUDY 

i.  References:  'PbiiL  4:15;  *I  Thess.  3:6-8*  'I  Thess. 
2:1-12;  *>Acts  18:1,  5;  *II  Thess.  2:1-3. 

2.  For  an  account  of  the  founding  of  the  church  at 
Thessalonica  read  Acts  17:1-15. 

3.  Note  the  occasion  of  I  Thess.,  3:6-8,  and  the  progress 
already  made  by  the  gospel,  1:7,  8;  2:1. 

4.  Picture  the  receipt  of  I  Thessalonians  by  the  Thes- 
salonian  Christians,  and  read  it  aloud  as  they  must  have 
done  in  a  meeting  of  the  church. 

5.  Note  Paul's  review  of  his  success  among  them,  1:2 — 
2:1;  his  vigorous  defense  of  his  method?  and  motives  as  a 
missionary,  2:1-12;  his  account  of  his  feelings  and  move- 
ments after  leaving  them,  2 :  17 — 3 :  10;  his  moral  teachings, 
•o  necessary  for  gentile  converts,  4:1-10;    5:8-13;    hia 


The  Letters  to  the  Thessalonians        7 

commendation  of  labor  and  self-support,  4:10-12;  the 
comfort  he  gives  them  about  the  Thessalonian  dead,  4 :  13-18, 
and  his  reminder  of  the  unexpectedness  of  the  return  of 
Jesus,  5:1-6. 

6.  Observe  the  prayerful  and  nobly  moral  tone  of  the 
letter,  the  intense  personal  affection  Paul  shows  for  his 
converts,  2:7-12, 17;  3:6-10,  and  the  sanity  of  his  practical 
advice,  4:11, 12;  5:12-14. 

7.  What  facts  about  Jesus  and  what  expectations  about 
him  does  the  letter  reveal ?  1:10;  2:15,19;  4:14-17;  5:9, 
10,  23. 

8.  Read  II  Thessalonians,  noting  its  marked  resemblance 
to  I  Thessalonians  in  many  particulars:  I  Thess.  2:9  and 
II  Thess.  3:8;  I  Thess.  3:11-13  and  II  Thess.  2:16,  17; 
I  Thess.  1:1-7  and  II  Thess.  1:1-4;  the  sterner  attitude 
toward  the  idlers,  3:6-15;  the  very  Jewish  argument  in 
2:1-10  that  the  Lawless  One  is  not  yet  openly  at  work  and 
therefore  the  Day  of  the  Lord  cannot  have  arrived;  and 
the  salutation  written  by  Paul's  own  hand  at  the  close, 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  LETTER  TO  THE  GALATIANS 

Upon  returning  to  the  shores  of  Syria  after  his 
long  residence  in  Corinth,  Paul  had  news  that 
greatly  disturbed  him.    An  enemy  had  appeared 
in  his  rear.    Among  the  people  who  had  accepted 
his  teaching  about  Jesus  were  many  in  the  towns 
of  central  Asia  Minor— Iconium,  Derbe,  Lystra, 
and  Antioch.    These  places  lay  in  what  the  Romans 
called  Galatia,  though  that  name  included  also  an 
additional  district  lying  farther  north.    They  were 
in  the  region  that  has  only  recently  been  traversed 
by  the  new  railway  through  Asia  Minor.     Their 
people  had  welcomed  Paul  as  an  apostle  of  Christ 
and  had  gladly  accepted  his  message  of  faith,  hope, 

and  love.  t    , 

But  there  had  now  come  among  them  Christian 
teachers  of  Jewish  birth,  who  looked  upon  the 
Christianity  Paul  presented  as  spurious  and  dan- 
gerous. Who  these  men  were  we  have  no  way  of 
knowing,  but  their  idea  of  Christianity  can  easily 
be  made  out.  They  believed  Jesus  to  be  the  com- 
pleter of  the  agreement  or  covenant  God  had  made 
with  Abraham.  In  order  to  benefit  by  his  gospel 
one  must  be  an  heir  of  Abraham,  they  held,  and 
thus  of  God's  agreement  with  him;   that  is,  one 

t 


The  Letter  to  the  Gaiatians  9 

must  be  born  a  Jew  or  become  one  by  accepting 
the  rite  of  circumcision  and  being  adopted  into  the 
Jewish  people.1 

There  was  certainly  some  reasonableness  in  this 
view.  The  men  who  held  it  were  indignant  that 
the  Gaiatians  should  call  themselves  Christians 
without  having  first  been  circumcised  and  having 
thus  acknowledged  their  adoption  into  the  Jewish 
nation;  and  they  considered  Paul  a  wholly  unau- 
thorized person  and  no  apostle  at  all,  since  he  was 
not  one  of  the  twelve  whom  Jesus  had  called  about 
him  in  Galilee  twenty  years  before,  nor  even  a 
representative  of  theirs.  It  was  evidently  the  feel- 
ing of  these  new  arrivals  that  the  twelve  apostles 
were  the  sole  genuine  authorities  on  Christianity 
and  what  might  be  taught  under  its  name.  This 
claim  also  seemed  reasonable,  and  it  made  the 
Galatian  believers  wonder  what  Paul's  relation  was 
to  these  authorized  leaders  of  the  church,  and  why 
he  had  given  them  so  imperfect  an  idea  of  the  gos- 
pel. They  admitted  the  justice  of  the  claims  of 
the  new  missionaries  and  set  about  conforming  to 
their  demands  in  order  that  they  might  be  as  good 
Christians  as  they  knew  how  to  be. 

Where  Paul  first  learned  of  this  change  in  the 
beliefs  of  the  Gaiatians  is  not  certain,  but  very 
probably  it  was  at  Antioch  in  Syria,  to  which  he 
returned  from  Corinth.  He  wished  to  proceed  as 
soon  as  possible  to  Galatia  to  straighten  matters 


io      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

out  in  person.  For  some  reason  he  could  not  start 
at  once,  and  so  he  wrote  or  dictated  a  letter  in 
which  he  did  his  best  to  show  the  Galatian  Chris- 
tians their  mistake.  This  he  sent  off  immediately, 
probably  intending  to  follow  it  in  person  as  soon 
as  he  could  do  so. 

The  letter  Paul  wrote  is  the  most  vigorous  and 
vehement  that  we  have  from  his  pen.    It  shows 
Paul  to  have  been  a  powerful  and  original  thinker, 
and  is  the  more  remarkable  as  it  was  written,  not  as 
a  book  or  an  essay,  but  simply  as  a  personal  letter, 
intended  to  save  some  of  his  friends  from  wrong 
views  of  religion.    In  opposition  to  the  claims  of 
the  Jewish-Christian  teachers  from  Palestine,  he 
affirms  with  his  very  first  words  that  he  is  an 
apostle,  divinely  commissioned,  with  an  authority 
quite  independent  of  that  of  the  apostles  at  Jeru- 
salem.   This  authority  Paul  bases  on  his  own  re- 
ligious experience  and  convictions,  in  which  he  feels 
that  the  Spirit  of  God  speaks  to  him;    and  this 
rightly  seems  to  him  the  best,  and  indeed  the  only, 
kind  of  religious  authority  that  really  reaches  the 

inner  life. 

The  demand  of  the  newcomers  in  Galatia  that 
the  Christians  there  should  undertake  some  of  the 
practices  of  the  Jewish  law,  such  as  circumcision 
and  the  religious  observance  of  certain  days,'  Paul 
denounces  as  unreasonable  and  dangerous.  It  is 
dangerous  because  if  acknowledged  it  will  surely 


The  Letter  to  the  Galatians  ii 

bring  in  after  it  the  necessity  of  obeying  all  the 
rest  of  the  Jewish  law,  and  will  reduce  the  religious 
life  of  the  Galatians  to  the  tedious  observance  of 
countless  religious  forms.3  It  is  unreasonable  be- 
cause, even  in  the  case  of  Abraham,  long  before 
there  was  any  Jewish  law,  faith,  that  is,  an  attitude 
of  trust  in  God  and  obedience  to  his  will,  was  the 
only  thing  that  made  men  pleasing  to  God.4  It 
was  when  the  Galatians  came  into  this  attitude 
of  trust  and  dependence  upon  God  that  they  felt 
the  presence  of  his  spirit  in  their  hearts  as  never 
before,  and  in  this  fact  Paul  rinds  evidence  of  the 
genuine  worth  of  the  gospel  of  faith  that  he  has 
preached  to  them.  The  Law  and  the  life  of  reli- 
gious formalism  which  it  brings  with  it  can  never 
bring  this  consciousness,  as  Paul  knows,  for  he 
gave  it  a  long  trial  before  giving  it  up  in  despair 
and  turning  to  the  gospel  of  faith,  hope,  and  love. 
In  a  word,  the  Law  makes  men  slaves,  the  Gospel 
makes  them  free.  This  has  been  Paul's  experience 
and  it  is  his  teaching. 

Galatians  is  in  fact  a  charter  of  religious  freedom. 
Its  noble  ideal  of  the  religious  life,  so  far  from  being 
outgrown,  still  beckons  us  forward,  as  it  did  those 
obscure  townsfolk  of  the  Galatian  uplands  long  ago. 
Paul  knew  its  dangers,  but  he  knew  its  promise  too, 
and  saw  that  for  those  who  would  sincerely  accept 
it,  it  opened  possibilities  of  spiritual  and  moral  de- 
velopment which  could  never  be  reached  by  the 


12      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

lower  path.  The  Christian  had  received  the  very 
Spirit  of  God.  By  that  he  must  regulate  his  life. 
If  he  did  so,  he  would  be  in  no  danger  of  gross  and 
vulgar  sin,  but  would  find  freely  springing  up  in 
his  life  the  fruit  of  the  spirit:  love,  joy,  peace, 
longsuffering,  kindness,  goodness,  faithfulness, 
meekness,  self-control. 

This  is  the  ringing  message  that  Paul  sent  in 
hot  haste  to  the  Galatians.    He  usually  dictated 
his  letters  to  one  of  his  companions,  such  as  Titus 
or  Tertius,  writing  only  a  line  or  two  himself  at  the 
end.    And  this  he  probably  did  in  this  case,  but 
emphasized  it  all,  with  a  touch  of  humor,  by  writ- 
ing his  autograph  lines  in  very  large  letters.5      But 
some  have  thought  that  in  his  haste  he  wrote  this 
entire  letter  with  his  own  hand.    It  was  carried  by 
some  trusty  messenger  away  through  the  moun- 
tains to  the  nearest  Galatian  church  and  there 
read  to  the  assembled  brethren.    Then  they  prob- 
ably sent  it  on  to  the  next  town  where  there  was  a 
band  of  believers,  and  so  it  passed  from  one  church 
to  another  until  all  had  heard  it.    Some  perhaps 
had  the  foresight  to  copy  it  before  it  was  sent  on 
its  way,  and  so  helped  to  preserve  to  later  times 
Paul's  first  great  letter. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOX  STUDY 

i.  References:  *Gal.  5:2-8;  6:12;  »Gal.  4:10;  JGaL  5:3; 
«Gal.  3:6-9, 16, 17;  «GaL6:u. 


The  Letter  to  the  Galatians  13 

2.  Read  the  account  of  the  founding  of  the  Galatian 
churches  in  Acts  13 :  13 — 14: 28. 

3.  Note  that  Paul  calls  himself  an  apostle  in  the  first 
words  of  Galatians  as  he  has  not  done  in  Thessalonians. 
Why?    Notice  the  occasion  of  the  letter,  1:6,  7;  3:1. 

4.  Read  the  letter  through  continuously,  noting  the 
autobiographical  chapters,  1,  2,  in  which  Paul  shows  his 
practical  independence  of  the  Jerusalem  leaders;  the  variety 
of  arguments,  chaps.  3,  4,  by  which  Paul  shows  the  folly 
of  seeking  salvation  through  the  observance  of  law;  and 
the  stirring  call  to  Christian  freedom  and  life  by  the  spirit 
which  concludes  the  letter,  chaps.  5,  6. 

5.  Read  the  letter  through  again,  noting  what  you  con- 
sider the  particularly  fine  passages  in  it. 

6.  What  does  Paul  mean  by  the  "marks  of  Jesus,"  Gal. 
6:17?  Can  these  be  the  scars  of  such  an  experience  as 
that  related  in  Acts  14:19,  which  befell  Paul  in  Galatia,  or 
that  in  Acts  16:22,  23,  which  occurred  after  Paul's  second 
visit  to  Galatia  and  before  he  wrote  this  letter?  Cf.  II. 
Cor.  11:24,  25.  The  figure  refers  to  the  owner's  marks 
which  were  branded  upon  slaves. 


CHAPTER  m 
THE  FIRST  LETTER  TO  THE  CORINTHIANS 

Paul  had  received  a  letter.     Doubtless  he  re- 
ceived many,  but  with  all  his  letter-writing  we 
know  definitely  of  only  one  letter  that  came  to  him. 
He  was  settled  at  Ephesus,  working  at  his  trade, 
and  very  much  absorbed  in  explaining  the  gospel 
to  everyone  whom  he  could  reach  in  that  city  and 
its  neighborhood.    Ephesus  was  a  thriving  center 
of  life  and  industry,  and  people  from  the  other 
cities  on  the  Aegean  were  constantly  coming  and 
going.     Among  them  were  many  from  Corinth, 
which  lay  almost  directly  across  from  Ephesus, 
only  a  few  days'   sail  away.    Some  of  the  Corin- 
thian visitors  to  Ephesus  were  Christians,   and 
others    were    acquainted    with    Paul's    Christian 
friends  at  Corinth  and  brought  him  word  of  them. 
Their  news  was  not  encouraging.     The  Corin- 
thian believers,  though  they  were  probably  few  and 
humble  in  station,  had  divided  into  parties1.  Some 
of  them  had  begun  to  look  down  upon  Paul  as  a 
man  of  inferior  gifts,  as  compared  with  the  eloquent 
Apollos,  and  of  insignificant  position  in  the  Chris- 
tian movement  as  compared  with  Cephas,  that  is, 
Peter.    They  had  perhaps  been  visited  by  Jewish- 
Christian  teachers  from  Jerusalem,  for  they  were 

14 


The  First  Letter  to  the  Corinthians     15 

beginning  to  doubt  Paul's  right  to  be  called  an 
apostle.*  Business  disputes  among  them  had  led 
to  lawsuits  between  Christian  brethren  in  the  pagan 
courts.3  Worst  of  all,  immoral  conduct  in  the  Co- 
rinthian church  was  reported  to  Paul,  for  the 
Corinthians  had  not  yet  fully  learned  that  the 
Christian  faith  meant  a  new  life  of  righteousness 
and  love.  With  all  these  abuses  the  very  existence 
of  the  little  church  was  being  endangered. 

Paul  was  already  troubled  by  these  reports  when 
three  Greeks  who  had  come  over  from  Corinth 
sought  out  his  lodgings  and  put  into  his  hand  a 
letter  from  the  Christians  of  Corinth.4  They  had 
been  Christians  only  a  little  while  and  had  many 
things  to  learn.  New  situations  were  constantly 
coming  up  which  they  did  not  know  how  to  meet. 
They  had  their  social  problems.  What  were  they 
to  do  about  marriage  ?  Should  they  marry  or  re- 
main single  ?  Should  a  woman  whose  husband  had 
not  been  converted  continue  to  live  with  him? 
When  they  were  invited  out  to  dinner  they  might 
have  served  to  them  meat  that  had  first  been 
offered  in  sacrifice  in  some  pagan  temple.  Was  it 
right  to  eat  such  meat,  and  must  they  inquire  about 
it  before  they  ate  it  ?  Questions  were  arising  about 
their  public  worship.  What  part  were  women  to 
have  in  it,  and  how  were  they  to  behave  and  dress  ? 
Even  the  Lord's  Supper  was  leading  to  excesses  in 
eating  and  drinking  and  bringing  out  inequalities 


16      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

and  misunderstandings.  The  Corinthians  were 
much  interested  in  spiritual  gifts  and  their  com- 
parative worth.  Some  rated  the  ecstatic  and  unin- 
telligible utterance  which  they  called  "speaking 
with  tongues"  above  prophesying  or  teaching. 
Moreover,  the  persons  endowed  with  these  gifts 
were  so  eager  to  be  heard  that  the  meetings  were 
becoming  confused  and  disorderly. 

On  the  whole  the  Corinthians  were  beset  with 
difficulties  on  all  sides,  and  they  wrote  to  Paul  for 
advice  and  instruction  regarding  their  problems. 
He  had  already  written  them  a  short  letter  about 
some  immoral  practices  that  had  appeared  among 
them  or  had  held  over  from  their  heathen  days.5 
But  that  letter  had  not  told  them  enough.  They 
wanted  to  learn  more  about  the  matter  it  dealt 
with,  and  about  a  variety  of  other  things.  ^ 

So  Paul  came  to  write  what  we  call  First  Co- 
rinthians.   No  wonder  it  is   so  varied  and  even 
miscellaneous.    Paul  has  first  to  set  right  the  bad 
practices  that  are  creeping  into  the  church-the 
factions,  the  lawsuits,  the  immoralities— and  to 
defend  himself  against  the  criticisms  that  are  bemg 
circulated  at  Corinth.     He  attacks  these  abuses 
with  the  utmost  boldness.    They  must  give  up 
their  factions.     Christ  must  not  be  divided.     If 
Paul  preached  to  them  a  simple  gospel,  it  is  be- 
cause their  immaturity  required  it.     And  it  was 
such  plain  preaching,  as  they  now  consider  it,  that 


The  First  Letter  to  the  Corinthians    17 

converted  them  to  a  life  of  faith.  The  gross  im- 
moralities which  Paul  has  heard  of  among  them 
ought  to  make  them  humble  and  ashamed  instead 
of  boastful.  Their  lawsuits  against  one  another 
disclose  their  unscrupulousness  and  self-seeking. 
Unrighteous  men,  Paul  reminds  them,  will  never 
enter  the  Kingdom  of  God. 

From  these  painful  matters  Paul  turns  to  the 
questions  the  Corinthians  had  asked  in  their  let- 
ter.6 Married  people  are  not  to  separate,  but  the 
unmarried  had  better  remain  as  they  are.  The 
offering  of  meat  to  idols  is  really  meaningless  and 
does  the  meat  no  harm,  yet  we  have  a  duty  to  the 
consciences  of  others,  and  must  not  give  them 
offense.  When  we  are  guests  at  a  dinner,  indeed, 
we  should  eat  what  is  offered  by  our  host  without 
asking  whether  it  has  been  offered  to  an  idol.  But 
in  our  freedom  we  are  to  remember  to  seek  the  good 
of  one  another. 

In  church  meetings  good  order  and  modest  be- 
havior are  to  be  the  rule  for  both  men  and  women. 
The  Lord's  Supper  especially  is  to  be  observed  in  a 
serious  and  considerate  way.  More  than  any  spir- 
itual gifts  Paul  recommends  faith,  hope,  and  love 
as  abiding  virtues,  much  to  be  preferred  to  the 
spectacular  and  temporary  endowments  in  which 
the  Corinthians  are  so  absorbed. 

Some  of  the  Corinthians  had  found  difficulty 
with  Paul's  teaching  about  the  resurrection,  and 


1 8      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

perhaps  a  question  about  it  had  been  raised  in 
their  letter  to  him.  At  all  events,  Paul  comes  last 
of  all  to  the  resurrection,  and  defends  his  belief  in 
it  in  an  impassioned  argument,  which  rises  at  the 
end  into  a  paean  of  triumph. 

So  far  has  Paul  brought  his  Corinthian  corre- 
spondents— from  their  petty  disputes  about  their 
favorite  preachers  to  the  serene  heights  of  the 
lyric  on  love  arid  the  vision  of  the  resurrection.  It 
is  instructive  to  see  how  he  has  done  it.  For  he 
has  worked  each  of  their  principal  difficulties 
through  with  them,  not  to  any  rule  or  statute,  but 
to  some  great  Christian  principle  which  meets  and 
solves  it.  Nowhere  does  Paul  appear  as  a  more 
patient  and  skilful  teacher  than  in  First  Corin- 
thians. And  nowhere  does  the  early  church  with 
its  faults  and  its  problems  rise  before  us  so  plainly 
and  clearly  as  here.  Someone  has  said  that  Paul's 
letters  enable  us  to  take  the  roof  off  the  meeting- 
places  of  the  early  Christians  and  look  inside. 
More  than  any  other  book  of  the  New  Testament 
it  is  First  Corinthians  that  does  this. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR  STUDY 

i.  References:  XI  Cor.  1:10-12;  *I  Cor.  9:1,  2;  3I  Cor. 
6:1-7;  4I  Cor.  7:1;  16:17;  SI  Cor.  5:9;  6I  Cor.  7:1. 

2.  Note  that  Paul  had  written  to  the  Corinthians 
before,  5:9.  Observe  the  sources  of  his  information  about 
matters  in  Corinth,  1:11;  7:1,  and  the  occasion  of  the 
letter,  7:1. 


The  First  Letter  to  the  Corinthians     19 

3.  Note  the  immaturity  of  the  Corinthian  Christians, 
as  illustrated  by  the  evils  Paul  tries  to  correct — factions, 
fornication,  lawsuits,  chaps.  1-6.  The  Corinthians'  letter 
evidently  asked  about  the  further  topics  of  the  letter, 
marriage,  meats  offered  to  idols,  the  Lord's  Supper,  spiritual 
gifts,  and  the  resurrection,  chaps.  7-15. 

4.  Observe  the  extraordinary  variety  of  the  letter's  con- 
tents, in  contrast  to  the  unity  of  Galatians. 

5.  Read  chap.  13,  the  prose  poem  on  love,  and  note 
that  Paul  commends  love  as  superior  to  the  spiritual  en- 
dowments which  the  Corinthians  so  overprize. 

6.  Consider  the  faults  and  perils  with  which  the  letter 
deals,  as  typical  of  the  experiences  of  a  young  gentile  church. 

7.  Notice  how  Paul  works  through  problems  put  before 
him  by  the  Corinthians  to  great  Christian  principles  of 
life,  8:13;   13:13;  cf.  6:19. 

8.  Note  the  beginnings  of  dissatisfaction  with  Paul  in 
Corinth,  reflected  in  1:12,  13;  2:1-5;  3-1-6,  18;  4:1-5, 
8-15. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  SECOND  LETTER  TO  THE  CORINTHIANS 

First  Corinthians  was  a  failure.  It  has  been  so 
useful  and  popular  in  every  other  age  of  Christian 
history  that  it  is  hard  to  believe  that  it  did  not 
accomplish  the  main  purpose  for  which  it  was 
written. 

The  factions  in  the  church  at  Corinth,  so  far 
from  sinking  their  differences  and  blending  har- 
moniously into  a  unified  church  life,  shifted  just 
enough  to  unite  all  who  for  any  reason  objected  to 
Paul,  and  then  faced  him  and  each  other  more 
rancorously  than  ever.    His  letters,  they  told  one 
another,  might  put  things  strongly,  but  after  all 
he  was,  when  you  actually  met  him,  a  man  of 
ineffectual  speech  and  insignificant  presence.1  The 
old  doubt  of  his  right  to  call  himself  an  apostle  still 
prevailed  at  Corinth.    What  right  had  he  to  set 
up  his  authority  against  that  of  Peter  and  the 
apostles  at  Jerusalem,  who  had  been  personal  fol- 
lowers of  Jesus  in  Galilee  ?    If  he  were  indeed  the 
apostle  he  claimed  to  be,  he  would  have  expected 
the  Corinthians  to  give  him  financial  support  during 
his  stay  among  them.a    His  failure  to  do  this  sug- 
gested that  he  was  none  too  sure  of  his  ground. 


to 


The  Second  Letter  to  the  Corinthians    21 

While  a  few  remained  loyal  to  Paul,  the  majority 
of  the  Corinthians  yielded  to  these  views. 

News  of  this  state  of  things  was  not  long  in 
traveling  across  the  Aegean  and  reaching  Paul,  and 
stirred  him  profoundly.  Perhaps  he  went  so  far 
as  to  visit  Corinth  and  face  his  accusers  in  per- 
son. But  if  he  did  so,  he  was  not  successful  in 
meeting  their  doubts  of  him  and  restoring  their 
confidence,  and  he  must  have  returned  to  his  work 
at  Ephesus  in  the  deepest  discouragement.  Yet 
he  was  in  no  mood  to  give  up  in  defeat  or  to  rest 
under  the  slanders  of  his  enemies,  and  he  made 
one  final  effort  in  a  letter  to  regain  his  lost  leader- 
ship at  Corinth.  This  letter  is  what  we  know  as 
the  last  four  chapters  of  Second  Corinthians. 

The  chief  characteristic  of  Paul's  letter  is  its 
boldness.  So  far  from  apologizing  for  himself,  he 
boasts  and  glories  in  his  authority,  his  endowments, 
and  his  achievements.  In  indignant  resentment  at 
their  persistent  misconstruing  of  his  motives  he 
fairly  overwhelms  them  with  a  torrent  of  burning 
words.  His  authority,  he  declares,  is  quite  equal 
to  any  demands  they  can  put  upon  it ;  as  the  recog- 
nized apostle  to  the  Gentiles  he  can  without 
stretching  his  authority  exercise  it  over  them,  and 
disobedience  to  it  will  bring  vengeance  when  mat- 
ters are  settled  up  between  them.  Conscious  that 
he  is  quite  the  equal  of  those  "exceeding  apostles," 
as  he  ironically  calls  them,  whom  the  Corinthians 


22      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

quote  against  him,  he  warns  the  latter  against  the 
teaching  of  such  apostolic  emissaries.5  His  policy 
of  self-support  in  Corinth  was  designed  to  save 
him  from  any  suspicion  of  self-interest  and  to  make 
the  disinterestedness  of  his  work  perfectly  unmis- 
takable. The  false  apostles  whom  they  are  now 
following  would  find  still  more  fault  with  him  had 
he  let  the  Corinthian  church  pay  his  expenses. 

Foolish  as  boasting  is,  he  will  for  once  outboast 
his  opponents.  In  purity  of  Jewish  descent  he  is 
fully  their  equal,  and  in  point  of  services,  sufferings, 
and  responsibilities  as  a  missionary  of  Christ  he  is 
easily  their  superior.4  More  than  this,  in  the  mat- 
ter of  those  ecstatic  spiritual  experiences,  visions 
and  revelations,  which  the  early  church  considered 
the  very  highest  credentials,  he  can  boast,  though 
it  is  not  well  to  do  so,  of  extraordinary  ecstasies 
that  he  has  experienced. 

For  all  this  foolish  boasting  they  are  responsible. 
They  have  forced  him  to  it  by  their  ingratitude. 
He  has  shown  himself  an  apostle  over  and  over 
again  at  Corinth,  but  they  have  not  been  satisfied 
with  that.  Now  he  is  coming  to  them  again,  but 
not  to  live  at  their  expense.  He  prefers  to  spend 
and  to  be  spent  for  them;  he  and  his  messengers 
have  asked  nothing  for  themselves.  He  writes  all 
this  not  for  his  own  sake  but  for  theirs.  They 
must  put  aside  their  feuds  and  factions  if  they  are 
to  remain  in  Christ.    Paul  is  coming  again  to  Cor- 


The  Second  Letter  to  the  Corinthians    2$ 

inth,  and  this  time  he  will  not  spare  offenders 
against  the  peace  of  the  church,  but  will  exert  the 
authority  they  have  denied. 

Paul  dispatched  this  letter  to  Corinth  by  the 
hand  of  Titus.  While  waiting  for  news  of  its  effect 
he  busied  himself  with  concluding  his  work  at 
Ephesus.  Days  came  and  went,  and  it  was  time 
for  Titus  to  return,  but  there  was  no  news  of  him. 
Paul's  thought  went  back  again  and  again  to  the 
situation  and  the  letter  he  had  written  in  such  dis- 
tress. Had  it  been  a  mistake  ?  He  began  to  think 
so,  and  was  sorry  he  had  written  it.s  If  it  did  not 
win  the  Corinthians,  matters  would  not  be  the 
same  as  before ;  they  would  be  much  worse.  If  the 
breach  was  not  healed  by  the  letter,  it  would  be 
widened.  Paul  was  still  full  of  these  anxious 
thoughts  when  the  time  came  to  leave  Ephesus. 
He  had  planned  to  go  next  to  Troas,  and  now  ex- 
pected Titus  to  meet  him  there,  but  to  his  great 
disappointment  Titus  did  not  appear.6  Conditions 
were  favorable  for  undertaking  missionary  work  in 
Troas,  but  Paul's  anxiety  would  not  let  him  stay, 
and  he  crossed  the  Aegean  to  Macedonia,  still 
hoping  to  find  Titus  and  learn  the  result  of  his 
mission  to  Corinth.  There  at  length  they  met,  and 
to  his  immense  relief  Paul  learned  of  his  messen- 
ger's success.7  The  Corinthians  were  convinced. 
Titus  and  the  letter  together  had  shown  them  their 
blunder.    They  realized  that  Paul  was  the  apostle 


24      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

he  claimed  to  be,  and  that  his  course  toward  them 
had  been  upright  and  honorable.  In  a  powerful 
revulsion  of  feeling  they  were  now  directing  their 
wrath  against  those  who  had  led  them  to  distrust 
and  oppose  Paul,  and  especially  against  one  man 
who  had  been  the  leader  of  the  opposition  to  him. 
They  were  eager  to  see  Paul  again  in  Corinth,  to 
assure  him  of  their  renewed  confidence  and  affec- 
tion, and  were  even  a  little  piqued  that  he  had  not 
already  come. 

Paul's  relief  and  satisfaction  found  expression 
in  another  letter,  the  fourth  and  last  of  which  we 
know  that  he  wrote  to  Corinth.  It  constitutes  the 
first  nine  chapters  of  Second  Corinthians.  He 
wishes  to  tell  the  Corinthians,  now  that  they  are 
ready  to  hear  it,  how  much  the  controversy  has 
cost  him,  and  how  great  his  relief  is  at  the  recon- 
ciliation. He  acknowledges  the  extraordinary  com- 
fort which  Titus'  news  has  given  him,  coming  as  it 
has  after  the  crushing  anxiety  of  those  last  days  at 
Ephesus.  He  is  satisfied  with  their  new  attitude, 
only  he  does  not  wish  them  to  misunderstand  his 
continued  absence.  He  had  intended  to  visit  Cor- 
inth on  his  way  to  Macedonia,  but  their  relations 
were  then  too  painful  for  a  personal  meeting,  and 
he  had  put  it  off.  When  he  leaves  Macedonia, 
however,  it  will  be  to  come  to  Corinth.  He  refers 
in  a  touching  way  to  the  anguish  and  sorrow  in 
which  he  wrote  his  last  letter  to  them,  and  to  his 


The  Second  Letter  to  the  Corinthians    25 

purpose  in  writing  it.  His  chief  opponent  whom 
they  are  now  so  loud  in  condemning  must  not  be 
too  harshly  dealt  with.  Paul  is  ready  to  join  them 
in  forgiving  him.« 

Paul  describes  his  anxious  search  for  Titus  and 
the  relief  he  felt  when  at  last  he  met  him  and  heard 
his  good  news.  He  no  longer  needs  to  defend  him- 
self to  the  Corinthians,  but  he  does  set  forth  again, 
in  a  conciliatory  tone,  his  ideals  and  methods  in  his 
ministry.  In  every  part  of  this  letter  Paul  shows 
that  warm  affection  for  the  Corinthians  which 
made  his  difference  with  them  so  painful  to  him. 

Paul  had  been  engaged  for  some  time  in  organ- 
izing among  his  churches  in  Asia  Minor  and  Greece 
the  collection  of  money  to  be  sent  back  to  the 
Jerusalem  Christians  as  a  conciliatory  token  that 
the  Greek  churches  felt  indebted  to  them  for 
the  gospel.  Such  a  gift  Paul  evidently  hoped 
might  help  to  reconcile  the  Jewish  Christians  of 
Jerusalem  to  the  rapidly  growing  Greek  wing  of 
the  church.  In  preparation  for  this  the  Mace- 
donians have  now  set  a  noble  example  of  liberality, 
and  Paul  seeks  to  stimulate  them  further  by  his 
report  that  the  district  to  which  Corinth  belongs 
has  had  its  money  ready  for  a  year  past.  He 
wishes  the  Corinthians  to  show  the  Macedonians 
that  he  has  not  been  mistaken.' 

It  is  natural  to  suppose  that  this  painful  chapter 
in  Paul's  correspondence  with  the  Corinthians  was 


26      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

not  put  in  circulation  at  once,  perhaps  not  at  aD 
while  the  men  who  were  involved  in  it  still  lived. 
The  Corinthians  could  hardly  have  wished  to  pub- 
lish the  evidence  of  their  own  even  temporary  dis- 
loyalty to  Paul,  and  visitors  from  other  churches 
probably  had  little  desire  to  take  home  copies  of  a 
correspondence  so  hotly  personal.  But  toward  the 
end  of  the  first  century  a  letter  from  Rome  revealed 
to  the  Corinthians  the  high  esteem  which  their 
earlier  letter  from  Paul  enjoyed  in  the  Roman 
church,  and  this  may  have  led  them  to  collect  and 
put  in  circulation  the  rest  of  their  letters  from  him. 
In  some  such  way,  at  any  rate,  these  last  letters  to 
Corinth  were  given  forth  together,  but  with  the 
letter  of  reconciliation  first,  to  take  the  bitterness 
off  and  commend  the  writing  to  the  reader  by  the 
fine  note  of  comfort  with  which  it  begins.  Second 
Corinthians  has  never  rivaled  First  Corinthians  in 
usefulness  and  influence,  but  no  letter  of  Paul 
throws  more  light  upon  his  character  and  motives. 
It  is  in  these  last  letters  to  Corinth  that  we  come 
nearest  to  Paul's  autobiography. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOE  STUDY 

i.  References:  "II  Cor.  10:10;  ,II  Cor.  11:7-9;  SH  Cor. 
11:5,  13;  <II  Cor.  11:21-33;  *II  Cor.  2:4;  7:8;  *II  Cor. 
2:12,  13;  *II  Cor.  7:5-7;  *II  Cor.  2:5-8;  »II  Cor.  9:1-5. 

2.  Read  chaps.  10-13,  noting  the  painful  stage  of  the 
controversy  between  Paul  and  the  Corinthians  reflected  in 
them. 


The  Second  Letter  to  the  Corinthians    27 

3.  What  is  the  chief  point  at  issue  between  them? 
11:5,  13;   12:11-13;   13:3. 

4.  Note  what  Paul's  Corinthian  critics  are  saying  about 
him,  10:1,  3,  10;  11:6,  7. 

5.  To  whom  does  Paul  refer  in  12:2,  3  ? 

6.  How  does  this  section,  chaps.  10-13,  fit  the  descrip- 
tion of  the  third  letter  to  Corinth  given  in  II  Cor.  2:2-4; 
7:8,9? 

7.  Note  in  contrast  to  it  the  tone  of  harmony  and  com- 
fort that  pervades  chaps.  1-9,  for  example  1:3-7. 

8.  Note  the  occasion  of  this  final  letter,  II  Cor.  2:12, 13; 

7:6,7. 

9.  Observe  the  increased  prominence  of  the  collection 
for  the  saints,  mentioned  in  I  Cor.  16:1-4,  an<3  now  again 
in  II  Cor.,  chaps.  8,  9. 


CHAPTER  V 
THE  LETTER  TO  THE  ROMANS 

Paul's  work  in  the  eastern  world  was  done.  For 
twenty-five  years  he  had  now  been  preaching  the 
gospel  in  Asia  Minor  and  Greece.  His  work  had 
begun  in  Syria  and  Cilicia,  then  extended  to  Cyprus 
and  Galatia,  then  to  Macedonia  and  Achaea,  and 
finally  to  Asia,  as  the  Romans  called  the  western- 
most province  of  Asia  Minor.  In  most  of  these 
districts  Paul  had  been  a  pioneer  preacher  and  had 
addressed  himself  mainly  to  Gentiles,  that  is, 
Greeks.  From  Syria  to  the  Adriatic  this  pioneer 
work  among  Greeks  had  now  gone  so  far  that  the 
gospel  might  be  expected  to  extend  from  the  places 
already  evangelized  and  soon  to  permeate  the 
whole  East.  Already  Paul  was  planning  to  transfer 
his  work  to  Spain,  where  the  gospel  had  not  yet 
penetrated. 

Between  Paul  in  Corinth  and  his  prospective 
field  in  the  far  west  lay  Rome,  the  center  and  me- 
tropolis of  the  Empire.  Christianity  had  already 
found  its  way  to  Rome  by  obscure  yet  significant 
ways.  Probably  Jews  and  Greeks  who  had  been 
converted  in  the  East  and  had  later  removed  to 
Rome,  in  search  of  better  business  conditions  or 
the  larger  opportunities  of  the  capital,  had  first 


The  Letter  to  the  Romans  29 

introduced  the  gospel  there  and  organized  little 
house  congregations.  The  fervor  of  the  early  be- 
lievers was  such  that  every  convert  was  a  mission- 
ary who  spread  the  good  news  wherever  he  traveled. 
The  fact  that  Christianity  was  already  established 
in  Rome  helps  us  to  understand  how  Paul  could 
think  that  Alexandria  and  Cyrene  needed  him  less 
than  Spain,  and  to  realize  how  many  other  Chris- 
tian missionaries  were  at  work  at  the  same  time 
with  Paul. 

Paul  was  eager  not  only  to  occupy  new  ground 
in  Spain,  but  also  to  visit  the  Roman  Christians  on 
his  way  and  to  have  a  part  in  shaping  a  church  for 
which  he  rightly  anticipated  an  influential  future. 

One  thing  stood  in  the  way  of  these  plans.  It 
was  the  collection  for  Jerusalem.  For  some  years 
Paul  had  been  organizing  the  beneficence  of  his 
western  churches,  not  to  sustain  wider  missionary 
campaigns  but  to  conciliate  the  original  believers 
in  Jerusalem.1  The  primitive  Jewish-Christian 
community  seems  rather  to  have  resented  the  vio- 
lent eagerness  with  which  the  Greeks  poured  into 
the  churches  and,  as  it  were,  took  the  Kingdom  of 
God  by  force.  The  Jewish  Christians  were  never 
altogether  satisfied  with  the  way  in  which  Paul  and 
his  helpers  offered  the  gospel  to  the  Greeks,  and 
the  growing  strength  of  the  Greek  wing  of  the 
church  increased  their  suspicion.  It  had  long  since 
been  suggested  to  Paul  that  this  suspicion  might  be 


30      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

allayed  by  interesting  his  Greek  converts  in  sup- 
plying the  wants  of  the  needy  Jewish  Christians  of 
Jerusalem,1  and  he  had  already  done  something  in 
that  direction.  A  more  extensive  measure  of  the 
same  sort  was  now  in  active  preparation.  The 
gentile  churches  of  four  provinces,  Galatia,  Asia, 
Macedonia,  and  Achaea,  were  uniting  in  it.  For 
nearly  two  years  the  Christians  of  these  regions 
had  been  setting  apart  each  week  what  they  could 
give  to  this  fund,  and  Second  Corinthians  shows 
how  Paul  encouraged  them  to  vie  with  one  another 
in  this  charitable  work — a  hint  of  the  importance 
the  enterprise  had  to  his  mind.  This  collection  for 
Jerusalem  has  especial  interest  as  the  first  united 
financial  effort  on  the  part  of  any  considerable 
section  of  the  ancient  church. 

The  clearest  evidence  of  the  importance  Paul 
attached  to  this  collection,  however,  is  the  fact 
that  he  turned  away  for  a  time  at  least  from  Rome 
and  Spain  in  order  to  carry  the  money  in  person 
to  Jerusalem.3  This  can  only  mean  that  he  felt 
that  the  whole  success  of  his  effort  would  hinge  on 
the  interpretation  which  its  bearer  put  upon  it 
when  he  delivered  the  gift  there.  In  the  wrong 
hands  it  might  altogether  fail  of  its  conciliatory 
purpose;  only  if  its  spiritual  significance  was  tact- 
fully brought  out  could  it  produce  the  desired  effect 
of  reconciling  the  Jewish  wing  of  the  Christian 
church  to  the  gentile. 


The  Letter  to  the  Romans  31 

Compelled  by  this  undertaking  to  give  up  for 
the  time  his  plan  of  moving  westward,  Paul  took  at 
least  the  first  step  toward  his  new  western  pro- 
gram. He  wrote  a  letter  to  the  Roman  Christians. 
The  letter  would  at  least  inform  them  of  his  plans 
and  interest,  and  so  prepare  the  way  for  his  com- 
ing. In  it  too  Paul  could  embody  his  gospel,  and 
so  safeguard  the  Roman  church  from  the  legalistic 
and  Judaistic  forms  of  Christian  teaching  that  had 
proved  so  dangerous  in  the  East.  And  if  this 
Jerusalem  journey  resulted  in  his  imprisonment  or 
even  his  death,  as  he  and  his  friends  feared,  this 
might  prove  his  only  opportunity  of  giving  to  the 
Romans  and  through  them  to  the  people  of  the 
West  the  heart  of  his  Christian  message. 

Righteousness  is  to  the  mind  of  Paul,  as  he 
reveals  his  thought  in  this  letter,  the  universal 
need.  Jews  and  Greeks  are  alike  in  need  of  it,  for 
neither  law  nor  wisdom  can  secure  it.  But  the 
good  news  is  that  God  has  now  through  Christ 
revealed  the  true  way  to  become  righteous  and  so 
acceptable  to  him.  This  is  accomplished  through 
faith,  which  is  not  intellectual  assent  to  this  or  that, 
but  a  relation  of  trustful  and  obedient  dependence 
upon  God,  such  as  Abraham  long  ago  exemplified. 
This  relation  is  fully  revealed  through  Christ,  and 
the  new  way  of  righteousness  has  been  confirmed 
and  illumined  by  his  death.  Persons  who  adopt 
this  attitude  of  faith  are  freed  by  it  from  sin  and 


32      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

from  the  tyranny  of  the  law.  The  spirit  of  God 
now  dwells  in  them  and  makes  them  his  sons,  never 
to  be  separated  from  his  love. 

In  the  failure  of  the  Jews  to  accept  the  gospel 
more  than  one  early  Christian  thinker  found  a 
serious  problem.  Was  God  unfaithful  to  his  prom- 
ises in  his  rejection  of  Israel?  Would  the  Jews 
never  turn  to  the  gospel  ?  Paul  explains  the  situa- 
tion as  due  to  the  Jews'  want  of  faith.  They  are 
not  ready  to  enter  into  the  filial  relation  that  Jesus 
taught  and  represented.  But  their  rejection  of  the 
gospel  and  God's  consequent  rejection  of  them  are 
not  in  his  opinion  final.  Some  day  they  will  turn 
to  the  righteousness  of  faith. 

This  setting  forth  of  Christian  righteousness  is 
the  longest  sustained  treatment  of  a  single  subject 
in  the  letters  of  Paul.  From  it  he  passes  in  conclu- 
sion to  instruct  the  Roman  Christians  upon  their 
practical  duties  to  God,  the  church,  the  state,  and 
society  in  general.  Few  things  are  more  striking  in 
these  earliest  Christian  documents  than  their  con- 
stant emphasis  upon  upright  and  ethical  living.  It 
is  interesting  to  find  Paul  urging  his  Roman  breth- 
ren to  be  loyal  citizens,  respecting  the  authority  of 
the  Roman  Empire  as  divinely  appointed,  and  the 
friend  and  ally  of  the  upright  man.4  The  event 
proved  that  in  this  he  idealized  the  Roman  state. 
Yet,  taking  the  situation  as  a  whole,  his  counsel 
was  both  wise  and  sound,  for  by  virtue  of  it  the 


The  Letter  to  the  Romans  33 

church,  at  grim  cost  indeed,  outlived  and  lived 
down  the  Empire's  misunderstanding. 

The  letter  to  the  Romans  is  often  thought  of  as 
the  best  single  expression  of  Paul's  theology.  But 
it  is  not  less  remarkable  for  its  picture  of  himself. 
In  it  he  appears  as  the  man  of  comprehensive  mind, 
not  alienated  from  his  own  people,  though  he  knows 
that  his  life  is  not  safe  among  them,  actively  con- 
cerned for  the  harmonizing  of  Greek  and  Jewish 
Christianity,  yet,  even  while  engaged  in  a  last 
earnest  effort  to  unite  the  eastern  churches,  eager 
to  have  a  hand  in  shaping  the  Roman  church  and 
to  reach  out  still  farther  to  evangelize  Spain.  The 
apostle  is  never  more  the  statesman-missionary 
than  in  the  pages  of  Romans. 

Many  years  after,  when  the  Christians  of  Ephe- 
sus  gathered  together  a  collection  of  the  letters  of 
Paul,  a  short  personal  letter  written  by  him  to 
Ephesus  from  Corinth,  probably  at  about  the 
time  he  wrote  Romans,  was  appended  to  Romans 
perhaps  because,  while  it  was  hardly  important 
enough  to  be  preserved  as  a  separate  letter,  yet, 
as  something  from  the  hand  of  Paul,  the  Ephe- 
sians  wished  to  keep  it  with  the  rest.  It  was 
written  to  introduce  Phoebe  of  the  church  at  Cen- 
chreae,  near  Corinth,  to  Paul's  old  friends  at 
Ephesus,  whither  she  was  going  on  some  errand.5 
A  Christian  traveling  about  the  Roman  world  on 
business  would  find  in  many  cities  communities  of 


34      The  Story  op  the  New  Testament 

brethren  ready  to  entertain  and  help  him.  The 
value  of  this,  in  an  age  when  the  inns  were  often 
places  of  evil  character,  can  be  imagined.  Most 
of  all,  Phoebe's  letter  of  introduction  discloses  to 
us  the  several  little  house  congregations  of  which 
the  whole  Christian  strength  of  a  great  city  like 
Ephesus  was  made  up  in  those  early  days  when 
the  church  was  still  in  the  house. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOE  STUDY 

i.  References:  xRom.  1:15;  15:22—26;  *Gal.  2:io;3Rom. 
15:28;  4Rom.  13:1-7;  JRom.  16:1. 

2.  Note  Paul's  circumstances  and  plans  at  the  time  of 
writing  Romans,  as  bearing  upon  its  occasion,  1:8-15; 

15:18-33- 

3.  Note  the  theme  of  the  letter,  1:16,  17. 

4.  Observe  Paul's  argument,  1 :  18 — 3 :  20,  that  Jews  and 
Greeks  are  both  in  need  of  the  salvation  he  describes. 

5.  Read  3:21 — 5:21,  considering  it  as  a  description  and 
explanation  of  this  new  righteousness. 

6.  Read  chaps.  7,  8,  considering  them  as  reflecting  Paul's 
personal  experience  in  seeking  righteousness  through  the 
Jewish  law. 

7.  Read  chaps,  o-n,  noting  the  difficulty  Paul  finds  in 
the  Jews'  rejection  of  the  gospel  (9:30,  31;  11  :i),  and  his 
hope  that  they  will  yet  accept  it. 

8.  Consider  chap.  16:  (1)  As  part  of  the  letter  to  the 
Romans:  how  can  we  explain  so  wide  an  acquaintance  on 
Paul's  part  with  Roman  Christians  before  he  had  visited 
Rome?  (2)  As  an  independent  letter  introducing  Phoebe 
to  some  nearer  church  like  that  at  Ephesus:  how  can  we 
explain  in  this  case  the  letter's  present  position  as  part  of 
Romans  ? 

9.  Why  does  Romans  stand  first  among  the  letters  of 
Paul,  although  it  is  far  from  being  the  oldest  of  them  ? 


CHAPTER  VI 
THE  LETTER  TO  THE  PHTLIPPIANS 

Paul  was  a  prisoner.  His  liberty  was  at  an  end. 
On  the  eve  of  a  new  missionary  campaign  in  Spain 
and  the  West  he  had  been  arrested  in  Jerusalem 
and  after  a  long  detention  sent  under  guard  to 
Rome  for  trial.  At  the  height  of  his  efficiency  the 
arm  of  the  Roman  Empire  halted  his  career  and 
changed  the  history  of  western  Christianity  before 
it  was  begun. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  overestimate  the  bitter- 
ness of  Paul's  disappointment.  The  great  task  of 
preaching  the  new  gospel  in  western  lands  must  go 
undone,  or  be  left  to  men  of  far  less  power  and 
vision,  while  the  one  man  in  all  the  world  fittest  for 
the  task  wore  out  his  years  in  a  dull  and  meaning- 
less imprisonment.  So  it  seems  to  us,  and  so  at 
least  at  times  it  must  have  seemed  to  Paul. 

Yet  in  his  prison  Paul  had  certain  compensa- 
tions. He  could  at  least  talk  of  the  gospel  to  his 
guards,  and  through  them  reach  a  wider  circle  with 
his  message.  And  he  could  keep  in  touch  with  his 
old  friends  and  even  make  new  ones  by  means  oi 
an  occasional  letter  to  Colossae  or  Philippi. 

The  first  church  Paul  had  founded  in  Europe 
was  in  the  Macedonian  city  of  Philippi,  and  the 
Philippians   were   among   his   oldest   and   truest 

3S 


36      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

friends.  They  did  not  forget  him  in  his  imprison- 
ment. Hardly  had  his  guards  brought  him  to 
Rome  when  a  man  arrived  from  Philippi  with  funds 
for  Paul's  needs  and  the  evident  intention  of  stay- 
ing with  him  to  the  end,  whatever  it  might  be. 
Nothing  could  have  been  more  loyal  or  more  prac- 
tical. Ancient  prisoners  even  more  than  modern 
ones  needed  money  if  their  lot  was  not  to  be  in- 
tolerably hard;  and  the  presence  at  Rome  of  one 
more  man  to  supply  Paul's  wants  and  do  his 
errands  must  have  been  a  great  convenience  to 
the  apostle. 

Unfortunately  this  man  fell  sick.  Rome  was 
never  a  healthful  city,  and  we  can  easily  imagine 
that  his  first  summer  there  may  have  been  too 
much  for  the  Philippian  Epaphroditus.  His  sick- 
ness of  course  interrupted  his  usefulness  to  Paul; 
indeed,  it  proved  so  serious  and  even  dangerous 
that  it  greatly  added  to  Paul's  anxieties.  When  at 
length  Epaphroditus  recovered  it  was  decided  that 
he  ought  to  return  to  Philippi,  and  to  explain  his 
return  to  the  Philippians  and  make  fresh  acknowl- 
edgment of  their  generous  behavior  Paul  wrote 
the  letter  that  has  immortalized  them. 

Paul  had  of  course  long  since  reported  to  the 
Philippians  the  arrival  of  Epaphroditus  and  ac- 
knowledged the  gift  he  had  brought.  The  news  of 
Epaphroditus'  illness  too  had  gone  back  to  Philippi, 
and  worry  over  that  fact,  and  a  certain  amount  of 


The  Letter  to  the  Philippians         37 

homesickness  besides,  had  added  to  the  misfortunes 
of  Epaphroditus.1  As  these  facts  put  very  kindly 
and  sympathetically  by  Paul  come  out  in  the  letter, 
we  cannot  escape  the  feeling  that  what  Paul  is 
writing  is  in  part  an  apology  for  the  return  of  Epa- 
phroditus, who,  the  Philippians  might  well  have 
thought,  should  not  have  left  Rome  as  long  as 
Paul  had  any  need  of  him.3 

Paul's  letter  exhibits  from  the  start  his  cordial 
understanding  with  the  Philippians.  They  are  his 
partners  in  the  great  gospel  enterprise.  From  the 
first  day  of  his  acquaintance  with  them  they  have 
been  so.  Again  and  again  in  his  missionary  travels 
they  have  sent  him  money,  being  the  first  church 
of  which  we  have  any  knowledge  which  put  money 
into  Christian  missions.  But  the  Philippians  did 
it  quite  as  much  for  Paul  their  friend  as  for  the 
missionary  cause;  for,  when  his  missionary  activity 
was  interrupted,  they  continued  and  increased 
their  gifts.  Amid  the  divisions  and  differences — 
with  Barnabas,  Mark,  Peter,  the  Jerusalem  pillars, 
the  Corinthians,  the  Galatians  and  their  teachers 
— which  attended  the  career  of  Paul,  it  is  refresh- 
ing to  find  one  church  that  never  misunderstood 
him,  but  supported  him  loyally  with  men  and 
money  when  he  was  at  the  height  of  his  missionary 
preaching  and  when  he  was  shut  up  in  prison; 
one  church  that  really  appreciated  Paul,  and  did 
itself   the  lasting  honor  of  giving  him  its  help. 


38      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Paul  is  able  to  tell  the  Philippians  that  his  im- 
prisonment has  not  checked  the  progress  of  the  gos- 
pel preaching  in  the  West.  Not  only  has  he  been 
able  to  reach  with  his  message  many  in  the  Prae- 
torian guard  and  in  that  vast  establishment  of 
slaves,  freedmen,  and  persons  of  every  station 
known  as  the  household  of  Caesar,  but  the  very 
fact  that  he  is  in  prison  for  his  faith  has  given  what 
little  preaching  he  can  still  do  added  power,  and 
inspired  other  Christians  to  preach  more  earnestly 
than  ever.  On  the  other  hand,  preachers  of  differ- 
ent views  of  Christianity  have  been  spurred  to  new 
exertions  now  that  their  great  opponent  is  off  the 
field.  So  Paul's  imprisonment  is  really  furthering 
the  preaching  of  the  gospel,  and  he  comforts  himself 
in  his  inactivity  with  this  reflection. 

The  Philippians  are  of  course  anxious  to  know 
what  Paul's  prospects  are  for  a  speedy  trial  and 
acquittal.  He  can  only  assure  them  of  his  own 
serenity  and  resignation.  If  he  is  to  die  and  be 
with  Christ,  he  is  more  than  ready;  but  if  there 
is  still  work  for  him  to  do  for  them  and  others, 
as  he  is  confident  there  is,  he  will  be  with  them 
again  to  help  and  cheer  them.  Meantime  he 
plans  to  send  Timothy  to  them  to  learn  how 
they  are,  and  he  hopes  shortly  to  be  able  to  come 
himself.  It  would  seem  that  while  Paul's  situa- 
tion is  still  decidedly  serious  it  is  not  altogether 
desperate. 


The  Letter  to  the  Phtlippians         39 

With  these  references  to  his  own  prospects  and 
the  progress  of  the  gospel  in  Rome,  Paul  combines 
a  great  deal  of  practical  instruction.  The  Philip- 
pians  are  to  cultivate  joy,  harmony,  unselfishness, 
and  love.  In  the  midst  of  his  letter3  some  chance 
event  or  sudden  recollection  brings  to  his  mind  the 
peril  they  are  in  from  the  ultra- Jewish  Christian 
teachers  who  have  so  disturbed  his  work  in  Galatia 
and  elsewhere,  and  he  prolongs  his  letter  to  warn 
the  Philippians  against  them. 

Paul  must  have  had  occasion  to  write  to  the 
Philippians  at  least  four  times  before  Epaphroditus 
carried  this  letter  back  to  them.  Perhaps  those 
earlier  letters  were  less  full  and  intimate,  confining 
themselves  closely  to  the  business  with  which  they 
dealt.  Or  perhaps  it  was  the  very  fact  that  this 
was  the  last  letter  they  ever  received  from  Paul 
that  made  the  Philippian  church  preserve  and 
prize  it.  For  out  of  his  narrow  prison  and  his  own 
hard  experience  Paul  had  sent  them  one  of  his 
greatest  expressions  of  the  principle  of  the  Chris- 
tian life:  "Brethren,  whatsoever  things  are  true, 
honorable,  just,  pure  ....  think  on  these  things 
....  and  the  God  of  peace  shall  be  with  you." 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR  STUDY 

i.  References:  'PhiL  2:26;  'Phil.  2:25,  29,30;  3Phil.  3:2. 
2.  Read  the  story  of  the  founding  of  the  Philippian 
church,  Acts  16:11-40. 


40      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

3.  On  what  occasions  did  Paul  probably  write  to 
the  Philippians?  Cf.  4:15,  16;  II  Cor.  11:9;  Phil.  2:25; 
4:10,  18. 

4.  Is  3 : 1  a  reference  to  a  former  letter  ? 

5.  For  Paul's  experiences  since  writing  to  the  Romans 
cf.  Acts  20:4 — 28:28. 

6.  What  effect  had  Paul's  imprisonment  had  on  the 
preaching  of  the  gospel  ?    Cf.  1 :  12-17. 

7.  How  does  Paul  view  the  propagation  of  other  types  of 
Christian  teaching  ?    Cf .  1 :  18 ;  3 : 2-6. 

8.  Consider  whether  this  letter  is  less  logically  organized 
than  Romans,  Galatians,  or  I  Corinthians.  How  do  you 
explain  its  inf  ormality  of  structure  ? 

9.  Notice  the  type  of  Christian  living  it  commends, 
2:1-18,  and  its  frequent  emphasis  of  joy. 

10.  Do  we  know  of  any  other  church  which  helped  Paul 
with  money  for  his  own  expenses  besides  that  at  Philippi  ? 
How  often  did  the  Philippians  do  this?  Cf.  4:15-18;  II 
Cor.  11:9. 

11.  What  does  the  letter  show  as  to  Paul's  own  attitude 
toward  his  imprisonment  and  possible  execution  ? 


CHAPTER   VII 

THE  LETTERS  TO  PHILEMON,  TO  THE  COLOS- 
SIANS,  AND  TO  THE  EPHESIANS 

Of  the  many  letters  Paul  must  have  written,  only 
one  that  is  purely  personal  has  come  down  to  us. 
It  was  sent  by  the  hand  of  a  runaway  slave  to  his 
master,  to  whom  Paul  was  sending  him  back. 

During  Paul's  imprisonment  at  Rome  he  had 
become  acquainted  with  a  young  man  named 
Onesimus,  who  under  his  influence  had  become  a 
Christian.  In  the  course  of  their  acquaintance 
Paul  had  learned  his  story.  He  had  been  a  slave 
and  had  belonged  to  a  certain  Philemon,  a  resident 
of  Colossae,  and  had  run  away  from  his  master, 
probably  taking  with  him  in  his  flight  money  or 
valuables  belonging  to  Philemon.  He  had  found 
his  way  to  Rome — for  it  seems  that  he  had  left 
Philemon  in  Colossae — and  so  had  been  brought 
by  a  strange  providence  within  the  reach  of  Paul's 
influence. 

Paul's  belief  in  the  speedy  return  of  Jesus  made 
him  attach  little  importance  to  freedom  or  servi- 
tude. He  prevailed  upon  the  slave  to  return  to 
his  master,  and  sent  by  him  a  letter  to  Philemon, 
whom  he  knew,  at  least  by  reputation,  as  a  leading 

41 


42      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Christian  of  Colossae.  He  asks  Philemon  to  re- 
ceive Onesimus,  now  his  brother  in  Christ,  as  he 
would  receive  Paul  himself,  and  if  Onesimus  is  in 
Philemon's  debt  for  something  he  may  have  stolen 
from  him,  Paul  undertakes  to  be  personally  re- 
sponsible for  it.  Having  thus  prepared  the  way 
for  a  reconciliation  between  Onesimus  and  his 
master,  Paul  asks  Philemon  to  prepare  to  entertain 
the  writer  himself,  as  he  hopes  soon  to  be  released, 
and  to  revisit  Asia, 

While  we  may  wonder  at  Paul's  returning  a 
runaway  slave  to  his  master  and  thus  counte- 
nancing human  slavery,  it  is  noteworthy  that  he 
sends  him  back  no  longer  as  a  slave,  but  more  than 
a  slave,  a  beloved  brother.  It  was  at  the  spirit  of 
slavery,  not  at  the  form  of  the  institution,  that 
Paul  struck  in  this  shortest  of  his  letters. 

The  letter  to  Philemon  was  not  the  only  one 
that  Paul  sent  to  Colossae  at  this  time.  There  had 
appeared  in  Rome  a  man  named  Epaphras,  who 
had  been  a  Christian  worker  in  Colossae  and  the 
neighboring  cities  of  Laodicea  and  Hierapolis.1  It 
was  probably  through  him  that  Paul  heard  that 
some  of  the  Colossians  had  begun  to  think  that  a 
higher  stage  of  Christian  experience  could  be  at- 
tained by  worship  of  certain  angelic  beings  and 
communion  with  them  than  by  mere  faith  in 
Christ.  They  recognized  the  value  of  communion 
with  Christ,  but  only  as  an  elementary  stage  in 


Philemon,  Colossians,  and  Ephesians    43 

this  mystic  initiation  which  they  claimed  to  enjoy. 
It  was  only  through  communion  with  these  beings 
or  principles,  they  held,  that  one  could  rise  to  an 
experience  of  the  divine  fulness  and  so  achieve  the 
highest  religious  development.  The  advocates  of 
this  strange  view  were  further  distinguished  by 
their  scrupulous  abstinence  from  certain  articles  of 
food  and  by  their  religious  observance  of  certain 
days — Sabbaths,  New  Moons,  and  feasts.  Their 
movement  threatened  not  only  to  divide  the  Co- 
lossian  church,  by  creating  within  it  a  caste  or 
clique  which  held  itself  above  its  brethren,  but  to 
reduce  Jesus  from  his  true  position  in  Christian 
experience  to  one  subordinate  to  that  of  the  imagi- 
nary beings  of  the  Colossian  speculations. 

Paul  had  never  visited  Colossae.  But  his  interest 
in  Epaphras  and  in  all  Greek  or  gentile  churches 
led  him  to  undertake  to  correct  the  mistake  of  the 
Colossians.  Still  a  prisoner  at  Rome,  he  could  not 
visit  Colossae  and  instruct  the  Christians  there  in 
person,  but  he  could  write  a  letter  and  send  it  to 
them  by  one  of  his  helpers,  who  was  also  to  conduct 
Onesimus  back  to  his  master  Philemon. 

Paul  begins  by  mentioning  the  good  report  of  the 
Colossian  church  which  has  reached  him,  and  ex- 
pressing his  deep  interest  in  its  members.  He 
proceeds  to  tell  them  of  the  ideal  of  spiritual  devel- 
opment which  he  has  for  them,  and  takes  occasion 
in  connection  with  it  to  show  them  the  pre-eminent 


44      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

place  of  Christ  in  relation  to  the  church.  In  him 
is  to  be  found  all  that  divine  fulness  that  some  of 
them  have  been  seeking  in  fanciful  speculations. 
This  is  the  gospel  of  which  Paul  has  been  a  minis- 
ter, especially  to  Gentiles  like  themselves.  He 
wishes  them  to  realize  his  interest  in  them  and  in 
their  neighbors  at  Laodicea,2  and  his  earnest  desire 
that  they  may  find  in  Christ  the  satisfaction  of  all 
their  religious  yearnings  and  aspirations. 

As  for  the  theosophic  ideas  which  are  being 
taught  among  them,  Paul  warns  the  Colossians  not 
to  be  misled  into  trying  to  combine  these  with  faith 
in  Christ.  In  Christ  all  the  divine  fulness  is  to  be 
found.  They  have  no  need  to  seek  it  elsewhere. 
The  ascetic  and  formal  practices,  "Handle  not,  nor 
taste,  nor  touch,"  which  are  becoming  fashionable 
at  Colossae,  are  likewise  without  religious  value 
and  foreign  to  Christianity. 

Over  against  these  futile  religious  ideas  and 
practices,  Paul  urges  the  Colossians  to  seek  the 
things  that  are  above.  They  are  to  live  true  and 
upright  lives,  as  people  chosen  of  God  should  do. 
The  peace  of  Christ  must  rule  in  their  hearts. 
Wives,  husbands,  children,  fathers,  slaves,  and 
masters  all  have  their  special  ways  of  service,  but 
everything  is  to  be  done  in  the  name  of  the  Lord 
Jesus. 

Paul  says  little  about  the  state  of  his  case. 
Tychicus,  who  takes  the  letter  to  them,  is  to  tell 


Philemon,  Colossians,  and  Ephesians    45 

them  about  that.  An  interesting  group  of  his 
friends  is  gathered  about  him  in  Rome,  and  in 
closing  the  letter  he  adds  their  salutations  to  his 
own.  Epaphras,  the  founder  of  cheir  church,  Mark, 
the  cousin  of  Barnabas,  and  Luke,  whom  Paul  here 
calls  the  "beloved  physician,"  are  among  the  num- 
ber. Paul  sends  an  earnest  exhortation  to  Archip- 
pus,  a  Christian  minister  at  Colossae,  and  asks 
the  Colossians  to  let  the  church  in  the  neighboring 
town  of  Laodicea  read  this  letter,  and  to  find  an 
opportunity  to  read  a  letter  he  is  sending  to  La- 
odicea.3 

What  has  become  of  this  Laodicean  letter? 
Some  ancient  Christian  writers  identify  it  with  the 
letter  we  call  Ephesians,  and  they  may  be  right. 
Perhaps  the  name  of  Ephesus  has  crept  into  the 
salutation  which  begins  the  letter  in  place  of  La- 
odicea. Or  perhaps  the  letter  was  sent  to  both 
places,  and  Paul  is  asking  the  Colossians  to  get 
hold  of  it  when  it  comes  to  the  nearer  church  at 
Laodicea, 

The  appearance  of  such  mistaken  ideas  among 
the  Christians  of  Colossae  must  have  shown  Paul 
what  low  and  inadequate  notions  many  Christians 
of  Asia  had  of  the  spiritual  significance  of  Christ. 
It  was  evidently  desirable  to  anticipate  and  prevent 
the  spread  of  these  views  by  presenting  a  higher 
conception  of  Christ's  place  and  function  in  reli- 
gious experience.     This  is  probably  what  Paul 


46      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

sought  to  do  in  the  letter  to  the  Laodiceans.  It  is 
clearly  what  he  undertakes  in  the  letter  known  to 
us  as  Ephesians.  Every  spiritual  blessing,  he  tells 
his  readers,  is  theirs  in  Christ.  Through  him 
they  are  adopted  by  God  as  sons.  Redemption 
and  forgiveness  and  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit 
they  receive  through  Christ.  Paul  would  have 
them  realize  the  greatness  and  richness  of  the 
Christian  salvation  which  God  has  wrought  in 
Christ,  whom  he  has  made  supreme.  To  this 
thought  of  the  supremacy  of  Christ,  Paul  comes 
back  repeatedly  in  the  letter.  He  is  deeply  con- 
cerned to  have  them  know  in  all  its  vast  proportions 
— breadth  and  length  and  height  and  depth — the 
love  of  Christ,  through  which  alone  the  human 
spirit  can  rise  into  the  fulness  of  God. 

Paul  writes  as  one  especially  commissioned  to 
the  Greek  world.4  It  is  through  Christ  that  the 
old  separation  of  Jews  from  Greeks  has  been 
brought  to  an  end,  and  the  same  great  religious 
possibilities  opened  before  both.  As  followers  of 
Christ  they  must  put  away  the  old  heathen  ways 
and  live  pure,  true,  and  Christlike  lives.  Wives 
and  husbands,  children  and  parents,  slaves  and 
masters  are  shown  how  they  may  find  in  the 
Christian  life  the  elevation  and  perfection  of  these 
relationships. 

Ephesians  is  very  much  like  Colossians.  This 
is  not  surprising,  if  it  was  written  at  the  same  time, 


Philemon,  Colossians,  and  Ephesians    47 

to  be  sent  by  the  same  hand,  to  one  or  more  of 
the  churches  in  the  region  of  Colossae;  and  we 
may  think  of  Tychicus  and  Onesimus  as  carrying 
with  them  on  their  journey  eastward  at  least  three 
letters — one  for  the  Christian  brethren  at  Laodicea, 
one  for  those  at  Colossae,  and  one  which  Onesimus 
must  with  no  little  trepidation  have  presented  at 
the  door  of  his  old  Colossian  master,  Philemon. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR  STUDY 

i .  References:  l  Col.  1:7,8;  '  Col.  2 : 1 ;  3  CoL  4:16;  *  Eph. 

3:1,  2. 

2.  Read  the  letter  to  Philemon  aloud,  and  imagine  how 
that  Christian  gentleman,  offended  at  the  conduct  of  his 
slave,  but  full  of  love  and  respect  for  Paul,  his  friend  and 
teacher,  would  feel  and  act  toward  Onesimus. 

3.  Note  the  letter's  picture  of  primitive  church  life  and 
the  light  it  throws  on  Paul's  character  and  on  his  attitude 
to  slavery. 

4.  Compare  the  persons  mentioned  in  Philem.,  vss.  1-3, 
10,  23,  24,  with  those  mentioned  in  Col.  1:1,  2;  4:7-17. 

5.  What  are  the  ideas  and  practices  criticized  in  Col., 
chap. 2  ? 

6.  What  connection  had  Paul  had  with  the  Colossians, 
and  how  did  he  know  of  conditions  among  them  ?  Cf .  CoL 
2:1;  1:3-8. 

7.  Note  the  resemblance  of  Ephesians  to  Colossians, 
comparing,  e.g.,  the  injunctions  to  wives,  husbands,  chil- 
dren, fathers,  servants,  and  masters  in  Col.  3:18 — 4:1  with 
Eph.  5:22 — 6:9. 

8.  Does  Eph.  3:2  sound  as  though  it  were  written  to 
Paul's  old  friends  at  Ephesus?  Cf.  Acts,  chap.  19,  and 
20:17-38. 


48      The  Story  op  the  New  Testament 

o.  With  the  impersonal  tone  of  Ephesians  contrast 
Rom.,  chap.  16,  with  its  numerous  personal  references  and 
messages.  Consider  whether  such  messages  would  be  likely 
to  occur  in  a  letter  sent  by  Paul  to  the  Ephesians  alone. 

10.  To  what  letter  does  Paul  refer  in  Eph.  3:3,  4? 

11.  How  far  was  this  new  development  in  Paul's  thought 
of  Christ  due  to  the  problems  which  had  arisen  among  the 
Christians  of  Asia  and  which  Paul  had  to  meet  ? 


CHAPTER  Vni 
THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MARK 

Peter  was  dead.  The  impulsive  apostle  who 
had  followed  Jesus  about  Galilee  had  lived  to  share 
in  the  world-wide  gentile  mission  and  had  met  his 
death  in  Rome.  With  him  the  chief  link  the 
Roman  church  had  had  with  the  earthly  ministry 
of  Jesus  was  gone.  Western  Christianity  had 
lost  its  one  great  human  document  for  the  life  of 
Jesus. 

The  familiar  stories  and  reminiscences  of  Jesus' 
words  and  doings  would  no  longer  be  heard  from 
the  lips  of  the  chief  apostle.  East  and  West  alike 
had  heard  them,  but  in  the  restless  activity  of  the 
gentile  mission,  and  especially  in  the  general  expec- 
tation of  Jesus'  speedy  return,  no  one  had  thought 
to  take  them  down.  And  so  with  Peter  a  priceless 
treasure  of  memorabilia  of  Jesus  passed  forevet 
from  the  world. 

But  there  still  lived  in  Rome  a  younger  man 
who  had  for  some  time  attended  the  old  apostle, 
and  who,  when  Peter  preached  in  his  native 
Aramaic  to  little  companies  of  Roman  Christians, 
had  stood  at  his  side  to  translate  his  words  into 
the  Greek  speech  of  his  hearers.  His  name  was 
Mark.    In  his  youth  he  had  gone  with  Paul  and 

49 


50      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Barnabas  on  their  first  missionary  journey  to  Cy- 
prus, but  had  disappointed  and  even  offended  Paul 
by  withdrawing  from  the  party  when  they  had 
landed  in  Pamphylia  and  proposed  to  push  on  into 
the  very  center  of  Asia  Minor.1  He  had  afterward 
gone  a  second  time  to  Cyprus  with  Barnabas,  to 
whom  he  was  closely  related.  Through  the  years 
that  had  passed  since  then  he  had  probably  kept 
in  close  touch  with  the  Christian  leaders  at  Antioch 
and  at  Jerusalem,  where  his  mother's  house  had 
been  from  the  first  a  center  for  the  Christian  com- 
munity. It  was  probably  as  Peter's  companion 
that  he  had  made  his  way  at  length  to  Rome,  and 
there  until  Peter's  martyrdom  had  served  the  old 
apostle  as  his  interpreter. 

Mark  saw  at  once  the  great  loss  the  churches 
would  sustain  if  Peter's  recollections  of  Jesus  per- 
ished, and  at  the  same  time  he  saw  a  way  to  pre- 
serve at  least  the  best  part  of  them  for  the  comfort 
and  instruction  of  the  Roman  believers.  He  had 
become  so  familiar  with  Peter's  preaching,  through 
his  practice  of  translating  it,  that  it  was  possible 
for  him  to  remember  and  write  down  much  that 
Peter  had  been  wont  to  tell  about  his  walks  and 
talks  with  Jesus  in  Galilee  and  Jerusalem,  more 
than  thirty  years  before. 

In  this  way  Mark  came  to  write  what  we  call 
the  Gospel  of  Mark.  But  Mark  did  not  call  it  his 
Gospel;  indeed  it  is  not  certain  that  he  called  it  a 


The  Gospel  According  to  Mark        51 

gospel  at  all;  and  if  he  had  thought  of  naming  its 
author  he  would  quite  certainly  have  called  it 
Peter's  work  rather  than  his  own.  But  the  order 
and  the  Greek  dress  of  the  Gospel  are  the  work  of 
Mark,  however  much  he  is  indebted  to  his  memory 
of  Peter's  sermons  for  the  facts  that  he  reports. 

In  the  selection  of  what  he  should  record,  Mark 
was  doubtless  often  influenced  by  the  conditions 
and  needs  of  the  Roman  Christians  for  whom  he 
wrote.  But  it  is  Peter's  picture  of  Jesus  that  he 
preserves,  not  of  course  just  as  Peter  would  have 
drawn  it,  yet  with  an  oriental  skill  in  story-telling 
which  may  be  Peter's  own.  We  see  Jesus  drawn 
by  John's  preaching  from  his  home  among  the 
hills  of  Galilee,  and  accepting  baptism  at  John's 
hands,  and  then  immediately  possessed  with  the 
Spirit  of  God  and  filled  with  a  divine  sense  of  his 
commission  as  God's  anointed  to  establish  God's 
Kingdom  in  the  world.  Yet  he  is  silent  until 
John's  arrest  and  imprisonment,  and  only  when 
John's  work  is  thus  cut  short  does  he  begin  preach- 
ing in  Galilee.2  Marvelous  cures  accompany  his 
preaching,  and  the  Galileans  soon  throng  about 
him  wherever  he  goes.  His  freedom  in  dealing 
not  only  with  Pharisaic  tradition  but  also  with 
the  precepts  of  the  Law  itself  soon  brings  him 
into  conflict  with  the  Pharisees,  and  their  increasing 
opposition  before  long  threatens  his  life.  After 
one  or  two  withdrawals  from  Galilee  in  search  of 


52      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

security  or  leisure  to  plan  his  course,  Jesus  at  length 
declares  to  his  disciples  his  purpose  of  going  up  to 
Jerusalem  to  the  springtime  feast  of  the  Passover. 
He  warns  them  that  the  movement  will  cost  him 
his  life,  but  declares  that  God  will  after  all  save 
him  and  raise  him  up.  Bewildered  and  alarmed, 
they  follow  him  through  Peraea  up  to  Jerusalem, 
which  he  enters  in  triumph,  now  for  the  first 
time  declaring  himself  the  Messiah  by  riding  into 
the  city  in  the  way  in  which  Zechariah  had  said 
the  Messiah  would  enter  it.3  Jesus  boldly  enters  the 
temple  and  drives  out  of  its  courts  the  privileged 
dealers  in  sacrificial  victims  who  had  made  it  their 
market-place.  The  Sadducees,  who  control  the 
temple  and  profit  by  these  abuses,  on  the  night  of 
the  Passover  have  him  arrested,  and  after  hasty 
examinations  before  Jewish  and  Roman  authori- 
ties hurry  him  the  next  morning  to  execution.  Up 
to  the  very  hour  of  his  arrest,  Jesus  does  not  give 
up  all  hope  of  succeeding  in  Jerusalem  and  win- 
ning the  nation  to  his  teaching  of  the  presence  of 
the  Kingdom  of  God  on  the  earth.4  The  book 
more  than  once  predicts  his  resurrection;  and  in 
its  complete  form  it  doubtless  contained  a  brief 
account  of  his  appearance  to  the  two  Marys  and 
Salome  after  his  burial;  but  it  had  by  the  be- 
ginning of  the  second  century  lost  its  original  end- 
ing, and  while  two  conclusions  have  been  used  in 
different  manuscripts  to  complete  it,  the  original 


The  Gospel  According  to  Mark        53 

one,  probably  only  ten  or  twelve  lines  long,  has 
never  been  certainly  restored. 

Informal  and  unambitious  as  Mark's  gospel 
narrative  is,  and  lightly  as  it  was  esteemed  in  the 
ancient  church,  in  comparison  with  the  richer 
works  of  Matthew  and  Luke,  no  more  convincing 
or  dramatic  account  has  been  written  of  the  sub- 
lime and  heroic  effort  of  Jesus  to  execute  the 
greatest  task  ever  conceived  by  man — to  set  up 
the  Kingdom  of  God  on  earth. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR   STUDY 

i.  References:  'Acts  13:13;  15:37-40;  "Mark  1:14; 
3Zech.  9:9;  4Mark  14:34-36. 

2.  Read  the  Gospel  of  Mark,  noting  that  it  consists  for 
the  most  part  of  short  units  of  narrative  embodying  some 
crisp  saying  of  Jesus. 

3.  Judging  from  Mark  alone,  how  much  time  would 
you  say  its  action  covered  ? 

4.  Observe  the  expectation  of  a  reappearance  of  Jesus 
in  Galilee  that  appears  in  the  Gospel  (14:28;  16:7),  but 
is  not  satisfied  in  the  present  conclusion,  16:9-20. 

5.  Consider  how  welcome  this  Gospel  must  have  been 
to  Christians  who  had  before  had  no  written  record  of 
Jesus'  life  or  ministry. 

6.  Is  it  probable  that  Peter,  in  the  selection  of  what  he 
should  relate  about  Jesus  in  his  sermons,  was  influenced 
by  the  needs  and  problems  of  his  hearers  ? 

7.  Is  it  probable  that  Mark  was  guided  in  part  in 
the  choice  of  what  he  should  include  in  his  Gospel  by  the 
situation  and  conditions  of  the  Roman  Christians  ? 

8.  How  long  would  it  have  taken  Jesus  to  utter  those 
sayings  of  his  which  Mark  preserves  ? 


54      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

g.  Note  the  large  part  played  by  wonders  of  healing, 
feeding,  etc.,  in  Mark,  and  the  usually  beneficent  character 
of  these. 

10.  What  wonders  recorded  in  the  Old  Testament  are 
most  like  those  of  Jesus  which  Mark  reports  ?  Cf .  I  Kings, 
chap.  17 — II  Kings,  chap.  2;  II  Kings,  chaps.  2-13. 

11.  Consider  whether  the  marvelous  is  peculiar  to  the 
New  Testament  or  whether  it  appears  in  contemporary 
Greco-Roman  literature — Suetonius,  Tacitus,  etc. — as  well. 

12.  Do  you  find  much  theology  in  Mark  ? 

13.  Does  Mark  regard  Jesus  as  the  Christ  ?  Does  Jesus 
so  describe  himself  in  this  Gospel?  What  does  he  mean 
by  "Son  of  Man"? 


CHAPTER  IX 
THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW 

The  Christian  movement  had  failed  in  its  first 
campaign.  The  nation  in  which  it  had  arisen  and 
to  which  its  founder  belonged  had  disowned  it.  It 
was  as  though  the  Israelites  had  refused  Moses. 
This  was  the  more  staggering  because  the  gospel 
had  been  represented  by  Jesus'  early  followers  as 
the  crown  and  completion  of  Judaism.  Jesus  was 
to  be  the  Jewish  Messiah,  through  whom  the 
nation's  high  hopes  of  spiritual  triumph  were  to 
be  realized.  But  the  Jews  had  refused  to  recognize 
in  him  the  long-expected  deliverer,  and  had  dis- 
claimed his  gospel.  Who  was  right  ?  The  prophets 
had  anticipated  a  redeemed  and  glorified  nation, 
but  the  nation  had  refused  to  be  redeemed  and 
glorified  by  such  a  Messiah.  The  divine  program 
had  broken  down. 

Yet  the  gospel  was  not  failing.  Among  the 
Greeks  of  the  Roman  Empire  it  was  having  large 
and  increasing  success.  Strangers  were  taking  the 
places  which  the  prophets  had  expected  would  be 
occupied  by  their  own  Jewish  countrymen.  The 
church  was  rapidly  becoming  a  Greek  affair. 
The  Gentiles  had  readily  accepted  the  Messiah  and 
made  him  their  own.    To  a  Christian  thinker  of 

55 


56      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Jewish  training  this  only  increased  the  difficulty 
of  the  problem.  For  how  could  the  messiahship  of 
Jesus  be  harmonized  with  the  nation's  rejection  of 
him  ?  The  prophets  had  associated  the  messianic 
deliverer  with  the  redeemed  nation,  but  the  event 
of  history  had  disappointed  this  hope.  What  did 
it  mean  ?  Were  the  prophets  wrong,  or  was  Jesus 
not  the  Messiah  ?  Paul  had  seen  the  difficulty,  and 
in  writing  to  the  Romans  had  proposed  a  solution. 
It  was  in  effect  that  the  Jews  would  ultimately 
turn  to  the  gospel,  and  so  all  Israel  would  be  saved. 
Yet  since  the  writing  of  Romans  the  breach  be- 
tween Jews  and  Christians  had  widened,  and  Paul's 
solution  seemed  more  improbable  than  ever. 

But  an  event  had  now  happened  which  put  a 
new  aspect  on  the  matter.  Jerusalem  had  fallen. 
The  downfall  of  the  Jewish  nation  put  into  the 
hand  of  the  evangelist  the  key  to  the  mystery. 
Jesus  was  the  Messiah  of  the  prophets.  He  had 
offered  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  to  the  Jews,  finally 
presenting  himself  as  Messiah  before  the  assembled 
nation  in  its  capital  at  its  great  annual  feast. 
Misled  by  its  religious  leaders,  the  nation  had  re- 
jected him  and  driven  him  to  his  death.  But  in 
this  rejection  it  had  condemned  itself.  God  had 
rejected  Israel  and  the  kingdom  it  had  disowned 
had  been  given  to  the  nations.  In  the  fall  of  Jeru- 
salem the  evangelist  saw  the  punishment  of  the 
Jewish  nation  for  its  rejection  of  the  Messiah,  and 


The  Gospel  According  to  Matthew     57 

in  this  fact  the  proof  that  the  gospel  was  intended 
for  all  nations. 

The  vehicle  for  this  trenchant  and  timely  phi- 
losophy of  early  Christian  history  was  to  be  a  book. 
It  may  be  called  the  first  book  of  Christian  litera- 
ture, for  Paul's  writings,  great  as  they  are,  are 
letters,  not  books,  and  Mark  for  all  its  value  is 
hardly  to  be  dignified  as  a  book,  in  the  sense  of  a 
conscious  literary  creation.  This  book  was  to  be  a 
life  of  the  Messiah,  which  should  articulate  the 
gospel  with  the  Jewish  scriptures  and  legitimize 
the  Christian  movement.  For  this  purpose  a  vari- 
ety of  materials  lay  ready  to  the  evangelist's  hand. 
The  narrative  we  know  as  Mark  was  familiar  to 
him.  He  had  also  a  collection  of  Jesus'  sayings  in 
Aramaic,  probably  from  the  hand  of  the  apostle 
Matthew,  and  one  or  two  other  primitive  docu- 
ments of  mingled  discourse  and  incident.  The 
mere  possession  of  these  partial  and  unrelated 
writings  was  in  itself  a  challenge  to  harmonize 
and  even  combine  them,  just  as  our  Four  Gospels 
have  ever  since  their  origin  invited  the  harmonist 
and  the  biographer. 

With  a  freedom  and  a  skill  that  are  alike  sur- 
prising, the  evangelist  has  wrought  these  materials 
into  the  first  life  of  Christ.  Perhaps  it  might  bettei 
be  called  the  first  historic  apology  for  universaj 
Christianity.  For  it  is  a  biography  with  a  purpose. 
Jesus,   though  legally  descended  from  Abraham 


58      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

through  the  royal  line  of  David,  is  really  begotten  of 
the  Holy  Spirit,  a  symbol  at  once  of  his  sinlessness 
and  his  sonship.  Divinely  acknowledged  as  Mes- 
siah at  his  baptism,  and  victorious  over  Satan  in 
the  temptation  conflict,  he  declares  his  message  in 
a  series  of  great  sermons,  setting  forth  in  each 
some  notable  aspect  of  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven. 
In  the  first  of  these,  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount, 
Jesus  demands  of  those  who  would  enter  the  new 
Kingdom  a  righteousness  higher  than  that  based 
by  the  scribes  upon  the  Jewish  law,  and  he  follows 
this  bold  demand  with  a  series  of  prophetic  and 
messianic  acts  which  show  his  right  to  make  it. 
The  Jewish  leaders  are  unconvinced  and  quickly 
become  hostile.  His  nearest  disciples  at  length 
recognize  in  him  the  Messiah,  and  he  welcomes 
this  expression  of  their  faith.1  Soon  afterward 
they  gain  a  new  idea  of  the  spiritual  and  prophetic 
character  of  his  messiahship  through  the  trans- 
figuration experience,  in  which  they  see  him  asso- 
ciated with  Moses  and  Elijah,  the  great  prophetic 
molders  of  the  Jewish  religion. 

Already  foreseeing  the  fatal  end  of  his  work, 
Jesus  yet  continues  to  preach  in  Galilee,  and  at  length 
sets  out  for  Jerusalem  to  put  the  nation  to  the 
supreme  test  of  accepting  or  refusing  his  message. 
They  refuse  it,  and  he  predicts  the  nation's  doom 
in  consequence.  The  Kingdom  of  God  shall  be 
taken  away  from  them  and  given  to  a  nation 


The  Gospel  According  to  Matthew     59 

that  brings  forth  the  fruits  thereof.3  The  last  dis- 
courses denounce  the  wickedness  and  hypocrisy  of 
the  nation's  religious  leaders,  and  pronounce  the 
doom  of  the  city  and  nation,  to  be  followed  shortly 
by  the  triumphant  return  of  the  Messiah  in  judg- 
ment. The  Jewish  leaders,  offended  at  his  claims 
of  authority,  cause  his  arrest  and  execution.  Yet 
on  the  third  day  he  reappears  to  some  women  of 
the  disciples'  company,  and  afterward  to  the  dis- 
ciples on  a  mountain  in  Galilee,  when  he  charges 
them  to  carry  his  gospel  to  all  the  nations. 

Jesus  had  expressly  confined  his  own  work  and 
that  of  his  disciples,  during  his  life,  to  the  Jews, 
but  since  they  had  refused  the  gospel,  his  last  com- 
mand to  his  followers  was  to  offer  it  henceforth 
to  all  mankind. 

The  Jewish  war  of  66-70  A.D.,  culminating  in 
the  fall  of  Jerusalem  and  the  destruction  of  the 
last  vestige  of  Jewish  national  life,  must  have 
brought  what  Jesus  had  said  of  these  things  power- 
fully before  his  followers'  minds,  and  shown  them  a 
welcome  solution  for  the  problem  that  perplexed 
them.  Jesus  had  not  come  to  destroy  Law  or 
prophets ;  his  work  and  its  fortunes  stood  in  close 
relation  with  them.  But  as  between  the  Jewish 
Messiah  and  the  Jewish  nation,  the  verdict  of  his- 
tory had  gone  for  the  Messiah  and  against  the 
nation,  for  the  nation  had  already  perished  while 
he  was  worshiped  by  half  the  world. 


60      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

The  obviousness  of  this  solution  to  our  minds 
is  simply  an  evidence  of  the  evangelist's  success  in 
grappling  with  the  problem;  for  we  owe  to  him  the 
solution  that  seems  so  simple  and  complete.  Few 
any  longer  stop  to  think  that  a  triumphant  Mes- 
siah apart  from  a  triumphant  nation  is  hardly 
hinted  at  in  the  Old  Testament  In  this  as  in 
other  respects  the  success  of  the  book  was  early 
and  lasting.  As  a  life  of  the  Messiah  it  swept  aside 
all  the  partial  documents  its  author  had  used  as 
his  sources.  Most  of  them  perished — among  them 
the  priceless  Sayings  by  Matthew  the  apostle — 
probably  because  the  evangelist  had  wrought  into 
his  book  everything  of  evident  worth  that  they 
contained.  Even  what  we  call  the  Gospel  of  Mark 
seems  by  the  narrowest  margin  to  have  escaped 
destruction  through  neglect,  and  its  escape  is 
the  more  to  be  wondered  at  since  practically  all 
that  it  offered  to  the  religious  life  of  the  early 
church  had  been  taken  up  into  this  new  life  of 
Christ. 

For  the  probably  Jewish-Christian  circle  for 
which  it  was  written  the  new  book  performed  a 
threefold  task.  It  solved,  by  its  philosophy  of 
Christian  history,  their  most  serious  intellectual 
problem.  It  harmonized  and  unified  their  diverse 
materials  relating  to  Jesus'  life  and  teaching.  And 
it  did  these  things  with  an  intuitive  sense  for  re- 
ligious values  that  has  given  it  its  unique  position 


The  Gospel  According  to  Matthew     6i 

ever  since.  Forty  years  after  it  was  written  it 
was  quoted  at  Antioch  as  "the  Gospel,"  being 
probably  the  first  book  to  bear  that  name.  Twenty 
years  later,  when  the  Ephesian  leaders  for  some 
reason  put  together  the  Four  Gospels,  the  first 
place  among  them  was  given  to  it,  and  its  name 
was  extended  to  the  whole  group.  A  new  desig- 
nation had  therefore  to  be  found  for  it,  and  it  was 
distinguished  as  "according  to  Matthew,"  prob- 
ably in  recognition  of  that  apostolic  record  which 
it  alone  embodied.  Of  its  actual  author,  however, 
we  know  only  that  he  was  a  Jewish  Christian  of 
insight  and  devotion,  who  preferred  to  remain  un- 
known, and  cared  only  to  exalt  the  figure  of  Jesus, 
the  Son  of  Man  and  the  Son  of  God. 

SUGGESTIONS   FOR   STUDY 

i.  References:  'Matt.  16:15-17;  aMatt.  21:43. 

2.  In  what  respects  is  the  scope  of  Matthew  wider  than 
that  of  Mark  ? 

3.  Note  the  great  discourses  characteristic  of  Matt., 
chaps.  5-7,  10,  13,  18,  23-25. 

4.  Note  that  practically  all  of  Mark  (all  but  perhaps  40 
verses)  is  taken  over  into  Matthew.  Can  you  think  of 
any  reason  for  Matthew's  omitting  Mark  7:3,  4;  8:22-26; 
12:32-34? 

5.  Compare  Matt.  16:13-20  with  Mark  8:27-30,  noting 
how  Jesus'  reticence  about  his  messiahship  disappears  in 
Matthew. 

6.  Compare  Matt.  21:19  with  Mark  11:20.  What  is 
the  effect  of  Matthew's  way  of  telling  the  story  ? 


62      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

7.  Notice  the  repeated  emphasis  on  the  fulfilment  of 
prophecy,  1:22;  2:15,17,23;  4:14;  8:17;  12:17;  13  =  35; 
21:4;  26:56;  27:9.  How  does  this  relate  to  the  purposes 
of  the  Gospel  ? 

8.  Notice  the  Beatitudes,  the  Lord's  Prayer,  and  the 
great  parables  of  Matthew. 

9.  Consider  whether  Matthew  is  richer  than  Mark  (1) 
theologically,  (2)  historically,  (3)  religiously. 


CHAPTER  X 
THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  LUKE 

The  acts  and  sayings  of  Jesus  seem  from  the 
earliest  times  to  have  been  taught  by  Christian 
missionaries  to  their  converts,  and  by  these  in  turn 
to  those  who  afterward  became  Christians.  Paul 
reminds  the  Corinthians  how  he  had  delivered  unto 
them  what  he  had  himself  received  as  to  the  Last 
Supper,1  and  the  death,  burial,  and  resurrection  of 
Jesus.*  Paul  had  been  taught  these  things  after  his 
conversion,  and  he  was  accustomed  to  tell  them 
to  his  converts.  In  this  way  the  principal  facts  of 
what  we  call  the  gospel  story  became  known  to 
all  Christian  believers. 

But  the  story  was  not  always  the  same.  Scores 
of  missionaries  were  at  work  about  the  eastern 
Mediterranean,  but  not  all  of  them  had  been  taught 
the  gospel  story  by  Paul  or  by  the  men  who  had 
taught  him.  The  Christians  who  fled  from  Judaea 
when  the  persecution  in  connection  with  Stephen's 
work  arose,  and  who  carried  the  gospel  into  various 
parts  of  the  eastern  world,  probably  did  not  tell 
their  converts  precisely  the  same  series  of  acts  and 
sayings  of  Jesus.  After  these  early  missionaries 
had  left  Judaea,  new  stories  and  sayings  about 
Jesus'  work  must  have  come  out  as  the  value  of 

6^ 


64      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

such  memories  became  more  evident.  Here  and 
there  people  took  the  trouble  to  write  down  these 
stories  for  their  own  instruction  and  enjoyment  or 
for  use  in  their  missionary  work.  Fifty  years  after 
Jesus'  death  there  had  in  these  ways  arisen  a 
variety  of  partial  accounts  of  his  birth,  his  minis- 
try, and  his  death  and  resurrection,  which  to  a 
thoughtful  mind  must  have  been  very  perplexing. 
It  was  this  perplexity  that  led  Paul's  friend 
Luke,  a  Greek  physician  living  somewhere  on  the 
shores  of  the  Aegean  Sea,  to  write  his  Gospel.  With 
this  confusion  of  partial  narratives  and  oral  tradi- 
tion intelligent  Greek  Christians  hardly  knew  what 
to  believe  about  the  life  and  teaching  of  Jesus.  One 
such  at  least,  a  certain  Theophilus,  a  man  of  posi- 
tion and  intelligence,  was  a  friend  of  Luke's,  and 
perhaps  suggested  to  him  his  perplexity  and  what 
ought  to  be  done  to  relieve  it.  For  him  and  for 
the  growing  class  of  intelligent  Christian  people 
Luke  undertook  to  bring  together  into  one  com- 
prehensive and  orderly  record  what  was  most  val- 
uable in  the  tradition  and  narratives  which  had 
sprung  up  in  various  parts  of  the  world.3 

Luke  traces  the  ancestry  of  Jesus  not  simply  to 
David  and  Abraham,  but  back  to  Adam  the  son  of 
God,  thus  emphasizing  his  human  nature  more 
than  his  Jewish  blood,  and  preparing  the  way  for 
his  later  emphasis  on  the  universal  elements  in 
Jesus'  ministry.     At  the  same  time  he  declares 


The  Gospel  According  to  Luke         65 

Jesus  to  be  in  a  special  and  immediate  sense  the 
child  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  The  consciousness  that 
he  is  God's  son  attends  Jesus  even  in  his  youth, 
when  after  a  visit  to  Jerusalem  he  lingers  in  the 
temple,  calling  it  his  Father's  house.4  At  the  very 
outset  of  his  ministry  Jesus  appears  in  the  syna- 
gogue at  Nazareth  and  declares  that  Isaiah's 
prophecy  of  a  Messiah  with  good  tidings  for  the 
poor  and  wretched  is  fulfilled  in  him.5  In  the  spirit 
of  this  prophecy  Jesus,  though  rejected  by  his 
townspeople,  goes  to  Capernaum  and  by  his  cures 
and  teaching  achieves  an  immediate  success.  Four 
fishermen  of  the  neighborhood  become  his  fol- 
lowers. He  goes  about  Galilee  teaching  the  people 
and  healing  the  sick  and  demon-possessed.  His 
disregard  of  scribal  precepts  and  his  claim  that  he 
has  power  to  forgive  sins  offend  the  Pharisees,  and 
they  begin  to  plot  against  him.  He  calls  twelve 
men  to  him  to  be  his  apostles,  and  in  a  great  sermon 
explains  to  his  disciples  the  moral  spirit  which 
should  govern  their  lives.6  Accompanied  by  the 
Twelve  he  continues  to  travel  about  Galilee,  teach- 
ing and  healing,  and  even  restoring  dead  persons 
to  life.  The  Twelve,  who  have  now  seen  some- 
thing of  his  work  and  spirit,  are  sent  forth  through 
the  country  to  heal  the  sick  and  cast  out  demons 
and  to  proclaim  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of  God. 
On  their  return  Jesus  feeds  a  multitude  with  a 
few  loaves,  and  afterward  asks  the  disciples  who 


66      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

the  people  think  him  to  be.  They  give  various 
answers,  but  Peter  pronounces  him  the  Messiah. 
Jesus  charges  them  to  keep  this  to  themselves,  and 
tells  them  that  rejection  and  death  lie  before  him, 
but  that  the  Kingdom  of  God  will  soon  come.  The 
transfiguration  gives  his  closest  intimates  a  better 
idea  of  the  kind  of  Messiah  he  is  to  be,  and  he  again 
foretells  his  death  and  resurrection. 

At  length  Jesus  sets  forth  on  the  momentous 
journey  to  Jerusalem,  sending  messengers  before 
him  to  make  ready  for  his  coming  in  the  villages 
through  which  he  is  to  pass.7  Teaching  and  healing 
as  he  goes,  he  is  more  than  once  entertained  by 
Pharisees,  and  on  one  occasion  is  warned  by  them 
of  the  danger  threatening  him  from  Herod;  but 
he  only  grows  more  earnest  in  his  warnings  against 
them.  In  the  parables  of  the  Lost  Sheep,  the  Lost 
Coin,  and  the  Lost  Son,  he  defends  his  course  in 
associating  with  sinners,  that  is,  persons  who  did 
not  fully  observe  the  Jewish  law.  As  he  approaches 
Jerusalem,  he  reminds  the  Twelve  that  death  and 
resurrection  await  him  there.  Reaching  the  city  he 
enters  it  in  messianic  state  amid  the  acclamations 
of  the  people.  He  goes  into  the  temple  and  clears 
it  of  the  traders  who  use  its  courts  for  their  traffic. 
The  Jewish  leaders  protest  and  demand  his  au- 
thority for  this  act.  His  answer  does  not  satisfy 
them  and  they  prepare  to  kill  him.  But  he  teaches 
daily  in  the  temple,  already  crowded  with  those 


The  Gospel  According  to  Luke        67 

who  had  come  up  for  the  feast  of  the  Passover, 
and  in  the  parable  of  the  Vineyard  he  sets  forth 
the  peril  of  the  nation  in  rejecting  and  destroying 
him.  After  a  series  of  clashes  with  Pharisees  and 
Sadducees,  he  foretells  the  destruction  of  Jerusa- 
lem, the  coming  of  the  Kingdom  of  God,  and  the 
return  of  the  Messiah  on  the  clouds  of  heaven.  He 
eats  the  Passover  supper  with  his  disciples,  and 
immediately  after  is  arrested  in  a  garden  on  the 
Mount  of  Olives.  After  a  series  of  examinations 
before  the  high  priest,  the  Jewish  council,  the 
Roman  procurator,  and  Herod,  the  tetrarch  of 
Galilee,  who  is  in  the  city,  and  although  neither 
Pilate  nor  Herod  find  him  guilty,  he  is  condemned 
and  crucified.  Immediately  after  the  Sabbath, 
however,  he  appears,  first  to  two  of  his  disciples, 
then  to  the  eleven  apostles  and  their  company  in 
Jerusalem.  He  reminds  them  that  all  this  has 
been  in  accord  with  the  Scriptures,  declares  that 
repentance  and  forgiveness  are  to  be  preached  in  his 
name  to  all  nations,  and  is  taken  from  them  into 
heaven. 

More  than  any  other  evangelist  Luke  claims  to 
have  a  historical  purpose.  His  aim  is  to  acquaint 
himself  with  all  the  sources,  oral  and  written,  for 
his  work,  and  to  set  forth  in  order  the  results  he 
ascertains.  It  is  this  historical  aim  that  leads  him 
to  fix  the  date  of  Jesus'  birth  by  the  Augustan 
enrolment  under  Quirinius,  to  date  the  appearance 


68      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

of  John  the  Baptist  in  the  fifteenth  year  of  Tiberius, 
and  to  tell  us  how  old  Jesus  was  when  he  began  to 
preach.  He  is  the  only  writer  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment who  sees  the  need  of  such  particulars  and 
tries  to  supply  them. 

Luke  is  evidently  a  Greek  writing  for  Greeks. 
The  fate  of  the  Jewish  nation  interests  him  less 
than  the  universal  elements  in  Jesus'  work.  The 
stories  of  Jesus  seeking  hospitality  in  a  Samaritan 
village,  of  the  good  Samaritan,  and  of  the  grateful 
Samaritan  leper,  suggest  Jesus'  interest  in  people 
outside  his  own  nation  and  foreshadow  the  uni- 
versal mission.  Luke's  Gospel  shows  a  peculiar 
social  and  humanitarian  interest;  the  poor  and 
unfortunate  appear  in  it  as  the  especial  objects 
of  Jesus'  sympathy  and  help.  A  few  echoes  of 
medical  language  in  the  Gospel  too  remind  us 
that  Luke  was,  as  Paul  calls  him  in  Colossians, 
"the  beloved  physician."8 

SUGGESTIONS  FOE  STUDY 

i.  References:  'I  Cor.  11:23;  »I  Cor.  15:3-7;  JLuke 
1:1-4;  4Luke  2:49;  *Luke  4: 16-21 ;  'Luke  6:20-49;  7Luke 
10:1;  *Col.  4:14- 

2.  Read  Luke  1 : 1-4,  noting  what  is  implied  as  to  pre- 
vious narratives  about  Jesus. 

3.  Notice  Luke's  use  of  the  first  person  in  his  preface, 
in  contrast  to  the  anonymity  of  Matthew  and  Mark. 

4.  Notice  his  historical  purpose  (cf.  1:5;  2:1,  2;  3:1, 
2,  23),  the  sources  he  has,  and  how  he  means  to  use  them. 


The  Gospel  According  to  Luke         69 

5.  Why  did  the  existence  of  numerous  accounts  lead 
Luke  to  write  another  one  ? 

6.  Although  Luke  seems  clearly  to  have  used  Mark,  he 
omits  one  account  of  the  feeding  of  the  multitudes  and  the 
account  of  the  cursing  of  the  fig  tree.  Why  does  he  do 
this? 

7.  Notice  that,  in  addition  to  the  infancy  narrative 
(chaps.  1,  2),  two  considerable  parts  of  Luke  (6:20 — 
8:3;  9 :  Si — 18 :  14)  contain  no  material  found  in  Mark. 

8.  Notice  the  remarkable  parables  of  Luke:  the  Lost 
Sheep,  the  Lost  Coin,  the  Lost  Son  (chap.  15),  the  Pharisee 
and  the  Publican  (18:9-14). 

9.  The  passage  from  Isaiah  which  appears  in  Luke  4: 18, 
19  has  been  called  the  frontispiece  of  the  Gospel  of  Luke. 
Why? 


CHAPTER  XI 
THE  ACTS  OF  THE  APOSTLES 

Within  fifty  years  after  the  death  of  Jesus  his 
gospel  had  spread  over  Palestine  and  Asia  Minor 
and  had  been  carried  by  travelers  and  mission- 
aries across  the  Aegean  Sea  to  Greece  and  over  the 
Mediterranean  to  Rome.  Companies  of  Christian 
believers  had  been  formed  in  the  principal  cities, 
and  the  new  faith  was  spreading  rapidly.  But 
few  of  these  new  Christians  had  any  clear  idea 
of  how  the  gospel  had  reached  their  communities, 
and  by  what  providential  means  and  through  what 
perils  and  difficulties  the  missionary  travelers  had 
found  their  way  to  Corinth,  Ephesus,  and  Rome. 
Few  had  any  idea  of  how  the  Christian  movement 
had  first  separated  itself  from  the  Jewish  faith  ;. 
how  it  had  ever  come  to  be  offered  to  Greeks,  when 
it  had  originally  belonged  exclusively  to  Jews; 
where  this  change  in  the  propagation  of  the  gospel 
had  begun,  and  who  had  first  undertaken  to  carry 
the  gospel  out  of  Syria  and  Palestine  into  the  other 
provinces  of  the  Roman  Empire. 

Some  men  still  lived  who  had  seen  this  wonderful 
Greek  mission  develop  and  who  had  learned  from 
others  how  it  had  begun.  They  knew  what  corn-age 
and  perseverance  and  faith  it  had  taken  to  bring 


The  Acts  of  the  Apostles  71 

about  its  spread  through  the  Roman  world,  and 
they  felt  that  it  would  strengthen  the  faith  and 
stimulate  the  zeal  of  the  Christian  believers  around 
them  to  hear  the  story  from  the  beginning.  In 
such  a  spirit  the  physician  Luke,  perhaps  in  some 
city  on  the  Aegean  Sea  like  Ephesus  or  Corinth, 
began  to  write  the  story  of  the  Greek  mission. 

He  was  himself  a  Greek,  and  knew  little  about 
the  beginnings  of  the  movement  except  what  others 
had  told  him.  But  he  was  a  close  friend  of  Paul, 
who  had  done  more  than  any  other  to  carry  the 
gospel  among  the  Greeks  of  the  Roman  provinces. 
He  had  been  with  Paul  on  some  of  his  most  danger- 
ous and  adventurous  journeys  and  in  some  of  his 
most  extraordinary  experiences.1  With  him  he  had 
visited  Antioch,  Caesarea,  and  Jerusalem,  and 
in  these  cities  he  had  met  people  who  could  tell 
him  much  about  the  strange  series  of  events  that 
had  led  the  earliest  Christians  to  push  out  first 
from  Jerusalem  to  Caesarea  and  Antioch,  and  then 
from  Antioch  to  Cyprus  and  Galatia.  Luke  had 
himself  witnessed  the  extension  of  the  movement 
from  Asia  Minor  to  Macedonia  and  Achaea,  and 
had  finally  followed  its  progress  to  Rome  itself. 
Supplementing  his  experiences  by  his  inquiries, 
Luke  fitted  himself  to  relate  the  fascinating  story, 
with  its  bewildering  variety  of  riots,  arrests,  trials, 
councils,  voyages,  shipwrecks,  imprisonments,  and 
escapes.    These  are  set  in  the  most  varied  scenes: 


72      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

temples,  market-places,  deserts,  islands,  syna- 
gogues, the  courts  of  kings  and  governors,  the 
streets  of  those  splendid  flourishing  cities  of  the 
Greco-Roman  world,  Antioch,  Ephesus,  Corinth, 
Athens,  Rome.  And  over  it  all  is  the  writer's  con- 
viction of  the  providential  hand  of  God  shaping 
the  decisions  and  movements  of  his  people  to  his 
own  great  purposes. 

Luke  felt  this  missionary  movement  to  be  so 
natural  a  sequel  to  the  ministry  of  Christ  that  he 
made  this  work  a  companion  volume  to  his  life  of 
Christ.1  In  both  of  them  his  purpose  is  at  once 
religious  and  historical.  He  wishes  to  strengthen 
the  faith  of  his  readers  and  commend  Christianity 
to  them.  At  the  same  time  he  wishes  to  make  their 
knowledge  of  Christian  history  more  exact  and 
complete.  We  should  have  liked  more  dermiteness 
in  the  dating  of  some  events,  and  here  and  there 
we  long  for  a  line  more  about  the  fate  of  Paul  or 
of  Peter,  the  work  of  missionaries  in  the  East  and 
South,  or  the  beginning  of  Christianity  in  Alexan- 
dria or  Rome.  But  we  must  admit  that  Luke  has 
told  his  story  to  its  climax,  for  with  the  churches 
once  established  in  Antioch,  Ephesus,  Corinth,  and 
Rome,  the  extension  of  the  gospel  to  the  rest  of 
the  Roman  world  about  the  Mediterranean  was 
inevitable. 

We  are  now  accustomed  to  view  history  as  a 
study  of  popular  forces  working  their  way  to  ex- 


The  Acts  of  the  Apostles  73 

pression  and  influence,  rather  than  of  battles, 
reigns,  and  dynasties.  With  such  a  sense  of  his- 
torical values  Luke  wrote  his  sketch  of  the  mission 
to  the  Gentiles.  Kings  and  wars  play  little  part 
in  it.  It  is  a  record  of  a  popular  movement,  at 
first  obscure,  then  gradually  making  itself  felt  in 
widening  circles  and  with  increasing  power.  Even 
when  he  wrote,  it  was  still  little  thought  of  and, 
indeed,  hardly  noticed  by  Greek  or  Roman  his- 
torians and  literary  men.  It  was  left  for  this 
Greek  physician,  the  friend  and  fellow-traveler  of 
Paul,  to  begin  the  writing  of  what  we  now  call 
church  history. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR   STUDY 

i.  References:  x Acts  16:11;  27:1,2;  Col.4:i4;  Philem. 
vs.  24;  'Acts  1:1. 

2.  Compare  the  preface  of  Luke,  1:1-4,  "with  the  open 
ing  lines  of  Acts,  1:1,2. 

3.  Notice  that  the  conclusion  of  the  Gospel  (24:49-53, 
is  reviewed  in  the  following  verses  of  Acts,  1:3-12,  so  that 
the  narrative  of  Acts  is  closely  joined  to  that  of  Luke. 

4.  Note  that  the  descent  of  the  Spirit  in  Acts  2 : 1-4  is 
in  fulfilment  of  the  promise  recorded  in  Luke  24 :  49. 

5.  Notice  the  many  lands  from  which  Peter's  hearers  at 
Pentecost  came,  and  to  which  those  of  them  who  were  con- 
verted would  return  with  the  gospel. 

6.  Notice  the  constant  emphasis  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  the 
Spirit  of  God,  and  the  Spirit  of  Jesus  in  Acts. 

7.  Read  Acts  1-7  as  an  account  of  the  development  of 
the  early  church  in  Jerusalem. 


74      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

8.  In  chaps.  8-12  note  the  gradual  spread  of  the  move- 
ment to  proselytes  and  Gentiles  in  Samaria,  Damascus, 
Joppa,  Caesarea,  and  especially  Antioch  (11:20).  Locate 
these  places  on  the  map. 

9.  Note  that  this  instinctive,  unorganized  missionary 
movement  at  length  takes  definite  shape  at  Antioch,  13:3. 

10.  Trace  Paul's  movements  through  Cyprus,  Galatia 
(chaps.  13,  14),  Macedonia,  Achaea  (chaps.  16-18),  and 
Asia  (chap.  19). 

11.  Observe  that  after  Paul's  arrest  Luke  continues 
to  trace  his  movements  and  experiences  until  he  has  spent 
two  years  at  Rome. 

12.  Consider  why  Luke  should  have  stopped  at  this 
point.  Did  he  write  at  this  time?  Or  did  he  purpose  to 
follow  Paul's  fortunes  farther  in  a  third  book  ?  Or  had  he 
reached  his  goal  in  tracing  the  establishment  of  churches 
through  the  gentile  world  from  Judaea  to  Rome  ? 

13.  Notice  those  parts  of  Acts  (16:10-18;  20:5-16;  21: 
1-18;  27:1—28:16)  in  which  the  writer  speaks  in  the  first 
person,  the  so-called  "  we  sections."  Consider  whether  there 
is  any  reason  for  thinking  them  to  be  by  another  hand  than 
that  which  wrote  the  Acts.  Where  else  does  Luke  speak  in 
the  first  person  ? 

14.  Notice  that  Acts  includes  many  accounts  of  wonders 
performed  by  apostles  and  others,  not  all  of  which  are  benefi- 
cent in  character  (5:1-11;  13:11). 


CHAPTER  XII 
THE  REVELATION  OF  JOHN 

It  was  a  dangerous  thing  in  the  first  century  to 
be  a  Christian.  Jesus  himself  had  laid  down  his 
life  for  his  cause,  and  the  apostles  Paul,  Peter, 
James,  and  John  met  their  deaths  as  martyrs,  that 
is,  witnesses,  to  the  new  faith.1  Yet  to  be  a  Chris- 
tian was  not  against  the  Roman  law,  and  through 
the  first  century  we  can  trace  the  Christians'  hope 
that  when  at  length  the  Roman  government  should 
decide  what  its  attitude  toward  Christians  was  to 
be,  the  decision  would  be  favorable.  Luke  points 
out  that  Pilate  himself  was  disposed  to  release 
Jesus,  and  expressly  says  that  neither  Herod  nor 
Pilate  found  any  fault  in  him.8  Luke  also  brings 
out  the  fact  that  the  proconsul  Gallio  at  Corinth 
would  not  even  entertain  a  charge  against  Paul, 
and  that  at  Caesarea  both  Agrippa  and  the  pro- 
curator Festus  declared  that  Paul  might  have  been 
released  if  he  had  not  appealed  to  the  emperor.3 
Paul  had  encouraged  his  converts  to  honor  the 
king,  that  is,  the  emperor,  and  obey  the  law,  and 
in  Second  Thessalonians  had  referred  to  the  em- 
peror as  a  great  restraining  power  holding  the 
forces  of  lawlessness  in  check.4 

7S 


76      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Nero's  savage  outbreak  against  the  Roman 
church  must  have  startled  and  appalled  Christians 
all  over  the  world,  but  that  attack,  though  severe, 
was  short,  and  left  the  status  of  Christians  before 
the  law  undecided  as  before.  Nero's  victims  suf- 
fered under  the  charge  of  burning  the  city,  not 
that  of  being  Christians,  and  Paul  himself,  as  Luke 
indicates,  was  tried  and  probably  executed  as  an 
agitator,  not  as  a  Christian.  It  is  clear  that  repre- 
sentative Christians  like  Luke  kept  hoping  that 
when  a  test  case  arose  the  Empire  would  not  con- 
demn the  Christian  movement  and  put  Christians 
under  its  ban. 

But  these  hopes  were  doomed  to  disappointment 
Late  in  the  reign  of  Domitian,  the  emperor-worship 
which  had  prevailed  in  some  parts  of  the 
Empire  since  the  time  of  Augustus  began  to 
threaten  the  peace  of  the  churches.  Earlier  em- 
perors had  for  the  most  part  let  it  take  its  course, 
but  Domitian  found  divine  honors  so  congenial 
that  he  came  to  insist  upon  them.  There  was 
indeed  an  obvious  political  value  in  binding  to- 
gether the  heterogeneous  populations  of  the  Empire, 
differing  in  speech,  race,  civilization,  and  religion, 
by  one  common  religious  loyalty  to  the  august  im- 
perator,  considered  as  in  a  certain  sense  divine. 
Most  oriental  peoples  found  this  easy.  Worship- 
ing numerous  gods,  they  did  not  much  object  to 
accepting  one  more. 


The  Revelation  of  John  77 

With  the  Christians  it  was  very  different.  Their 
faith  forbade  such  an  acknowledgment,  and  the 
scattered  churches  of  Asia,  where  the  matter  first 
became  acute,  now  witnessed  the  disappointment 
of  their  cherished  hope  of  freedom  to  worship 
God  undisturbed,  in  their  own  way.  It  is  hard  to 
realize  all  that  this  meant  to  them.  Their  early 
teachers  had  been  mistaken.  The  Empire  was  not 
their  friend  and  safeguard,  to  be  loyally  obeyed. 
It  now  suddenly  appeared  in  its  true  colors  as  their 
bitter  and  unrelenting  foe.  For  it  inexorably  de- 
manded from  them  a  worship  of  the  emperor  which 
Christians  must  refuse  to  accord.  The  church  and 
the  Empire  were  finally  and  hopelessly  at  war. 

The  Christian  leaders  of  Asia  must  have  realized 
this  with  stricken  hearts,  and  they  must  have 
reviewed  the  history  of  the  Christian  movement 
from  a  new  point  of  view.  After  all,  what  else 
could  they  have  expected  ?  Jesus,  Paul,  and  Peter 
had  suffered  death  for  the  Kingdom  of  God,  and  at 
the  hands  of  Rome.  In  Nero's  day  hundreds  of 
others  had  perished  in  Rome  at  the  emperor's  bid- 
ding. The  Empire,  as  they  now  saw,  had  long 
since  recorded  its  verdict,  and  it  had  been  against 
them. 

The  matter  of  worshiping  the  emperor  came  home 
to  the  Christians  of  Asia  in  various  forms.  His 
name  and  likeness  appeared  on  many  of  the  coins 
they  used.    He  had  among  them  his  provincial 


78      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

priesthood,  charged  with  the  maintenance  of  his 
worship  throughout  Asia.  Christians  might  be 
called  upon,  as  Pliny  tells  us  they  were  twenty 
years  later,  to  worship  the  image  of  the  emperor. 
It  was  customary  to  attest  legal  documents — con- 
tracts, wills,  leases,  and  the  like — with  an  oath  by 
the  fortune  of  the  emperor.  Refusal  to  make  this 
sworn  indorsement  would  at  once  involve  one 
in  suspicion  and  lead  to  official  inquiries  as  to  the 
apparent  disloyalty  of  the  person  concerned  to 
the  imperial  government.  Why  not  then  make  the 
oath  ?  It  was  after  all  a  purely  formal  matter  with 
all  who  used  it  Why  not  simply  add  to  one's 
business  documents,  as  everyone  did,  the  harmless 
words,  "And  I  make  oath  by  the  Emperor  Domi- 
tianus  Caesar  Augustus  Germanicus  that  I  have 
made  no  false  statement"  ?  So  slight  an  accommo- 
dation might  seem  a  very  excusable  way  to  gain 
security  and  peace. 

But  in  even  slight  concessions  to  pagan  practice 
the  Christian  leaders  of  Asia  saw  a  serious  peril. 
There  must  be  no  compromise.  The  church  might 
perish  in  the  conflict,  but  the  conflict  could  not  be 
avoided.  The  church  must  brace  itself  for  the 
struggle,  and  compromising  was  not  the  way  to 
begin.  On  the  contrary,  the  church  must  abso- 
lutely disavow  everything  pertaining  to  the  wicked 
system  through  which  the  devil  himself  was  now 
assailing  it.    For  in  the  Empire  the  Asian  Chris- 


The  Revelation  oe  John  79 

tians  now  recognized  not  a  beneficent  and  protect- 
ing power  but  an  instrument  of  Satan. 

Among  the  first  victims  of  the  kindling  perse- 
cution was  a  Christian  prophet  of  Ephesus,  named 
John.  He  seems  to  have  been  arrested  on  the 
charge  of  being  a  Christian  and  banished  to  the 
neighboring  island  of  Patmos,  perhaps  condemned 
to  hard  labor.  He  could  no  longer  perform  for  his 
Asian  fellow-Christians  the  prophet's  work  of  edifi- 
cation, comfort,  and  consolation  described  by  Paul 
in  First  Corinthians,5  though  they  needed  it  now 
as  never  before.  But  he  might  hope  to  reach  them 
by  letters,  and,  as  he  wrote  these  to  the  seven  lead- 
ing churches  of  Asia,  his  message  expanded  into  a 
book.  He  uses  the  cryptic  symbolic  forms  of  the 
old  Jewish  apocalypses,  of  Daniel  or  Enoch,  in 
which  empires  and  movements  figure  in  the  guise 
of  beasts  and  monsters,  and  the  slow  development 
of  historical  forces  is  pictured  as  vivid  personal 
conflict  between  embodiments  of  rival  powers.  In- 
deed, his  message  is  one  that  may  not  be  put  in 
plain  words,  for  it  contains  a  bitter  attack  upon 
the  government  under  which  the  prophet  and  his 
readers  live. 

The  canon  of  the  writings  of  the  prophets  had 
long  been  regarded  by  the  Jews  as  closed,  and  any- 
one who  wished  to  put  forth  a  religious  message  as 
a  work  of  prophecy  had  therefore  to  assume  the 
name  of  some  ancient  patriarch  or  prophet    But 


80      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

the  Christians  believed  the  prophetic  spirit  to  have 
been  given  anew  to  them,  and  a  Christian  prophet 
had  no  need  to  disguise  his  identity.  John  in 
Patmos  writes  to  the  neighboring  churches  as  their 
brother,  who  shares  with  them  the  agony  of  the 
rising  persecution. 

The  task  of  the  exiled  prophet  was  to  stiffen  his 
brothers  in  Asia  against  the  temptations  of  apostasy 
and  compromise  which  the  persecution  would  in- 
evitably bring.  He  would  arouse  their  faith.  In 
the  apparent  hopelessness  of  their  position,  a  few 
scattered  bands  of  humble  people  arrayed  against 
the  giant  world-wide  strength  of  the  Roman  Em- 
pire, they  needed  to  have  shown  to  them  the  great 
eternal  forces  that  were  on  their  side  and  insured 
their  final  victory.  For  in  this  conflict  Rome  was 
not  to  triumph,  but  to  perish. 

The  prophet's  letters  to  the  seven  churches  con- 
vey to  them  the  particular  lessons  that  he  knows 
they  need.  But  one  note  is  common  to  all  the 
letters.  "To  him  that  overcometh,"  to  the  victor 
in  the  impending  trial,  the  prophet  promises  a 
divine  reward.  But  this  is  only  the  beginning  of 
his  message.  Caught  up  in  his  meditation  into 
the  very  presence  of  God,  the  prophet  in  the 
spirit  sees  him,  as  Isaiah  saw  him,  enthroned  in 
ineffable  splendor.6  In  his  hand  is  a  roll  crowded 
with  writing  and  sealed  seven  times  to  shut  its 
contents   from   sight.     Only   the  Lamb   of   God 


The  Revelation  of  John  8i 

proves  able  to  unfasten  these  seals  and  unlock  the 
mysterious  book  of  destiny,  which  seems  to  con- 
tain the  will  of  God  for  the  future  of  the  world,  and 
to  need  to  be  opened  in  order  to  be  realized. 
Dreadful  plagues  of  invasion,  war,  famine,  pesti- 
lence, and  convulsion  attend  the  breaking  of  the 
successive  seals,  doubtless  reflecting  familiar  con- 
temporary events  in  which  the  prophet  sees  the 
beginning  of  the  end.  On  the  opening  of  the 
seventh  seal  seven  angels  with  trumpets  stand 
forth  and  blow,  each  blast  heralding  some  new 
disaster  for  mankind.  Despite  these  warnings 
men  continue  in  idolatry  and  wickedness.  The 
seventh  trumpet  at  length  sounds  and  proclaims 
the  triumph  of  the  Kingdom  of  God,  to  which  the 
prophet  believes  all  the  miseries  and  catastrophes  of 
his  time  are  leading. 

The  victory  is  thus  assured,  but  it  has  yet  to 
be  won.  The  prophet  now  sees  the  dragon  Satan 
engaged  by  the  archangel  Michael  and  the  heavenly 
armies.  Defeated  in  heaven,  the  dragon  next  as- 
sails the  saints  upon  the  earth.  In  this  campaign 
Satan  has  two  allies,  one  from  the  sea — the  Roman 
Empire — the  other  from  the  earth — the  emperor 
Domitian,  or  the  priesthood  of  his  cult.  Again 
the  prophet's  vision  changes.  Seven  bowls  sym- 
bolizing the  wrath  of  God,  now  at  last  irrepressible, 
are  poured  out  upon  the  earth.  An  angel  shows 
him  the  supreme  abomination,  Rome,  sitting  on 


82      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

seven  hills  and  drunk  with  the  blood  of  the  saints. 
Another  angel  declares  to  him  her  doom,  over 
which  kings  and  merchants  lament,  while  a  thun- 
derous chorus  of  praise  to  the  Lord  God  Omnipo- 
tent arises  from  the  redeemed.  The  prophet's 
thought  hastens  on  from  the  fate  of  persecuting 
Rome  and  the  imprisonment  of  Satan  to  the  glori- 
fication of  those  who  have  suffered  martyrdom 
rather  than  worship  the  emperor.  As  priests  of 
God  they  reign  with  Christ  a  thousand  years,  until 
the  great  white  throne  appears,  and  the  dead,  small 
and  great,  stand  before  it  for  the  final  judgment. 

These  lurid  scenes  of  plague  and  convulsion  now 
give  way  to  the  serene  beauty  of  the  new  heavens 
and  the  new  earth,  with  the  new  Jerusalem  coming 
down  out  of  heaven  from  God  who  makes  all 
things  new.  Amid  its  glories  God's  servants,  tri- 
umphant after  their  trial  and  anguish,  serve  him 
and  look  upon  his  face. 

The  prophet  begins  with  a  blessing  upon  anyone 
who  shall  read  his  prophecy  and  upon  those  who 
shall  hear  it  read.  He  closes  with  a  warning  against 
any  tampering  with  its  contents.  The  book  is 
clearly  intended  to  be  read  at  Christian  meetings. 
More  than  this,  by  its  repeated  claim  of  prophetic 
character,  it  stands  apart  as  the  one  book  in  the 
New  Testament  that  unequivocally  declares  itself 
to  be  Scripture.  It  is  thus  in  a  real  sense  the  nucleus 
of  the  New  Testament  collection. 


The  Revelation  of  John  83 

The  Revelation  is  not  a  loyal  book.  Its  writer 
hates  the  Roman  government  and  denounces  its 
wickedness  in  persecuting  the  church  in  unmeas- 
ured terms  which  every  Christian  of  the  day  must 
have  understood.  It  does  not  indeed  advise  rebel- 
lion, but  it  is,  from  an  official  Roman  point  of 
view,  a  seditious  and  incendiary  pamphlet.  But 
so  symbolic  and  enigmatical  is  its  language  that 
few  outside  of  Jewish  or  Christian  circles  can  have 
understood  its  meaning,  or  guessed  that  by  Babylon 
the  prophet  meant  the  Roman  Empire.  Its  value 
to  the  frightened  and  wavering  Christians  of  Asia 
must  have  been  great,  for  it  promised  them  an. 
early  and  complete  deliverance,  and  cheered  the^i 
to  steadfastness  and  devotion.  Their  trial  indeed 
proved  less  severe  than  they  had  feared,  for  twenty 
years  later  Ignatius  found  these  same  churches 
strong  and  earnest,  and  forty  years  after  the  writing 
of  Revelation  a  Christian  convert  named  Justin 
found  this  book  still  prized  by  the  Ephesian  church. 
Ignatius  and  Justin  both  suffered  martyrdom  in 
Rome,  and  joined  the  army  of  those  who  had  come 
out  of  great  tribulation,  and  had  made  their  robes 
white  in  the  blood  of  the  Lamb.  But  in  these  suc- 
cessive conflicts,  and  through  many  more  down  to 
the  present  day,  Christians  have  cheered  them- 
selves in  persecution  with  the  glowing  promises  and 
high-souled  courage  of  the  banished  prophet  of 
Ephesus,  who  m  the  face  of  hopeless  defeat  and 


84      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

destruction  showed  a  faith  that  looked  through 
death,  and  in  stirring  and  immortal  pictures  assured 
his  troubled  brethren  of  the  certain  and  glorious 
triumph  of  the  Kingdom  of  God. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOE   STUDY 

i.  References:  'Mark  10:35,  39;  Acts  12:2;  John  21:18, 
19;  'Luke  23:14-16;  JActs  26:31,  32;  *H  Thess.  2:7;  SI 
Cor.  14:3;  6Rev.,  chap.  4. 

2.  Read  Dan.,  chaps.  7,  8,  as  examples  of  Jewish  apoca- 
lyptic. 

3.  Read  Rev.,  chaps.  1-3,  noticing  the  light  they  throw 
upon  the  state  of  Christianity  in  Asia. 

4.  Read  chap.  4,  the  prophet's  vision  of  God,  noting  its 
resemblance  to  Isa.,  chap.  6,  and  Ezek.,  chap.  1. 

5.  Notice  in  chaps.  6-1 1  the  seven  seals  leading  up  to 
the  seven  trumpets,  each  one  symbolizing  some  invasion, 
earthquake,  slaughter,  disaster,  or  other  of  the  Last  Woes. 

6.  Notice  in  chaps.  12,  13  the  war  against  the  church 
begun  in  heaven  and  continued  on  earth  by  the  dragon  and 
his  allies. 

7.  Observe  in  chaps.  15,  16  the  seven  bowls  of  wrath 
preluding  the  destruction,  in  chaps.  17,  18,  of  Rome,  the 
persecutor  of  the  church. 

8.  Notice  that  chap.  20  presents  the  climax  of  the  whole 
in  the  judgment  scene,  while  chaps.  21,  22  describe  the  city 
of  God  and  the  happiness  of  his  people,  now  delivered  from 
their  persecutors. 

9.  Observe  the  solemn  warning  of  the  prophet  against 
any  tampering  with  his  work,  22:18,  19, 

10.  What  are  the  main  religious  ideas  underlying  all 
this  oriental  imagery  ? 


CHAPTER  XIII 
THE  EPISTLE  TO  THE  HEBREWS 

Of  all  the  early  centers  of  Christianity  the  church 
at  Rome  went  through  the  most  significant  and 
dramatic  experiences.  Founded  by  unknown  per- 
sons about  the  middle  of  the  first  century,  it  enter- 
tained Paul  and  Peter,  Luke  and  Mark,  witnessed 
the  martyrdom  of  the  chief  apostles  and  piously 
tended  their  graves,  in  a  single  generation  with- 
stood the  fires  of  two  persecutions,  and  served  in 
short  as  the  focus  of  Christian  life  in  the  capital  of 
the  world. 

All  this  was  not  effected  without  sacrifice  and 
devotion.  It  is  the  Christians  of  Rome  who  first 
appear  in  the  pages  of  the  history  of  the  Empire, 
and  it  was  the  extraordinary  sufferings  they  en- 
dured that  led  the  historian  to  mention  them.1 
Hardly  a  dozen  years  after  the  Roman  church  had 
been  established  there  burst  upon  it  the  storm  of 
Nero's  persecution,  of  brief  duration  but  of  frightful 
severity.  Many  of  the  Christians  of  Rome  suffered 
agonizing  martyrdom,  and  all  of  them  faced  it  with 
a  heroism  that  wrung  sympathy  even  from  the 
callous  populace  of  that  brutal  city.  In  that 
dreadful  August  of  64  a.d.  the  Roman  Christians 
learned  what  it  was  to  have  their  dearest  friends 

8s 


86      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

and  leaders  torn  from  them,  to  attend  these  friends 
to  prison  and  to  cruel  and  mocking  deaths,  to  lose 
their  little  savings  by  capricious  confiscation,  and 
so  to  be  brought  by  the  events  of  a  single  month  to 
the  very  verge  of  ruin  and  despair. 

From  such  a  baptism  of  fire  the  Roman  Chris- 
tians emerged  reduced  in  property  and  numbers, 
but  more  than  ever  convinced  that  they  were  pil- 
grims upon  the  earth  and  that  their  citizenship 
was  in  heaven.  They  were  sustained  in  this  by  the 
hope  in  which  Paul  and  Peter  had  confirmed  them, 
that  Jesus  would  soon  return  to  set  up  his  messianic 
kingdom,  and  that  then  their  troubles  would  be 
over.  Their  immediate  troubles  did  soon  pass  and 
gave  way  to  a  reasonable  degree  of  security  and 
peace,  but  the  hope  of  Jesus'  coming  remained 
unfulfilled. 

Years  went  by.  The  churches  settled  down 
from  their  first  exuberant  spiritual  enthusiasm  into 
a  partial  accommodation  to  a  work-a-day  world. 
They  had  their  officers,  their  meetings,  their  insti- 
tutions. They  still  expected  the  return  of  Jesus, 
but  only  as  people  might  who  had  been  expecting 
it  all  their  lives.  The  expectation  could  hardly 
play  the  part  in  their  religious  lives  that  it  had  in 
their  fathers'.  But  evidences  were  beginning  to 
appear  that  they  were  in  turn  to  be  put  to  the  test 
to  which  Nero  had  put  their  predecessors.  Domi- 
tian  was  emperor.     Conspiracies  and  losses  had 


The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  87 

embittered  and  frightened  him.  He  had  begun  in 
Rome  that  reign  of  terror  which  so  horrified  high- 
minded  Romans  like  Tacitus  who  had  to  witness  it. 

What  first  led  Domitian  to  threaten  the  Roman 
church  is  not  clear.  It  may  have  been  his  insist- 
ence upon  divine  honors  for  himself,  as  it  was  in 
Asia.  '  It  may  have  been  the  collection  for  the 
benefit  of  Jupiter  Capitolinus,  of  the  temple  tax 
from  the  Jews,  and  the  incidental  confusing  of 
Christians  with  the  latter.  Or  perhaps  the  in- 
ability of  a  Christian  magistrate  to  perform  the 
religious  duties  his  office  imposed  upon  him  first 
brought  the  Christians  again  under  attack.  At 
any  rate,  toward  the  very  end  of  Domitian's  life, 
he  made  a  series  of  attacks  upon  the  Christians  of 
Rome  which  left  a  deep  impression  upon  them. 

The  Roman  church  had  more  than  made  up  the 
losses  Nero  had  inflicted  upon  it.  It  had  continued 
to  practice  that  duty  of  Christian  hospitality  which 
its  location  imposed  upon  it,  and  to  attend  to  the 
needs  of  Christian  prisoners  who  were  brought  to 
Rome  as  Paul  had  been.  It  had  not,  however, 
developed  any  outstanding  Christian  teachers,  nor 
as  yet  taken  the  place  of  leadership  among  the 
churches  for  which  its  position  at  Rome  naturally 
marked  it  out.  It  was  a  practical  church,  but  a 
church  without  imagination.  The  fact  that  Jesus 
had  been  executed  like  a  slave  or  a  criminal  was 
hard  for  it  to  understand  and  to  harmonize  with 


88      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

the  messiahship  he  claimed.  And  with  the  passing 
of  time  the  expectation  of  Jesus'  return  to  the  earth 
had  declined  in  eagerness  and  confidence,  leaving 
the  Roman  Christians  far  less  ready  to  withstand 
the  shock  of  persecution  than  their  fathers  had 
been  thirty  years  before. 

But  persecution  and  apostasy  were  not  the  only 
dangers  that  threatened  the  Roman  church.  The 
very  age  of  the  church  now  exposed  it  to  a  peril  of 
apathy  and  indifference  which  could  never  have 
menaced  it  in  its  youth,  when  enthusiasm  was  new 
and  hope  high.  While  some  might  continue  to 
hold  in  a  mild  way  their  expectation  of  Jesus' 
coming,  others,  now  that  the  generation  that  had 
known  Jesus  in  Galilee  had  passed  away  and  Jesus 
had  not  returned,  felt  that  the  expectation  so  long 
disappointed  had  been  vain,  and  that  the  Christian 
movement  was  played  out. 

It  was  to  this  situation  that  some  Christian 
teacher,  unknown  to.  us  but  well  known  at  Rome, 
addressed  the  letter  which  from  its  strongly  Jewish 
tone  has  come  to  be  called  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews.  The  writer  was  not  in  Italy,  though 
other  Christians  from  Italy  were  with  him  when 
he  wrote,  and  perhaps  from  what  they  had  told 
him,  or  from  what  he  had  himself  observed  in  Rome, 
the  perilous  situation  of  the  Roman  community 
was  clear  to  him.  But  the  Roman  church  must  not 
go  down.    Its  noble  traditions  of  devotion  and  serv- 


The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  89 

ice  must  not  sink  into  oblivion.  Above  all  the 
great  task  for  which  it  was  in  the  writer's  mind  so 
clearly  marked  out  must  be  performed.  The  church 
must  not  only  survive  but  rise  to  higher  forms  of 
service,  that  should  eclipse  all  that  it  had  yet  done. 
This  is  the  kindling  ideal  that  this  great  unknown 
of  the  first  century  puts  before  the  wavering  line  of 
Roman  Christians.  Seeing  them  unequal  to  their 
present  task,  he  nerves  them  for  a  greater. 

The  Christian  scholar  who  undertook  to  meet 
this  situation  took  as  his  theme  the  complete  and 
final  character  of  the  revelation  made  in  Christ. 
As  compared  with  the  beings,  men  or  angels, 
through  whom  the  old  Jewish  revelation  was  made, 
Christ  is  immeasurably  superior.  They  were  at 
best  God's  servants;  he  is  God's  son.  How  shall 
anyone  escape  who  neglects  a  salvation  so  su- 
premely authoritative?  The  Romans  must  learn 
the  awful  lesson  of  the  Israelites  in  the  wilderness. 
Like  them  they  have  had  good  news  and  set  forth 
for  a  better  country ;  let  them  not  like  the  Israelites, 
through  unbelief  and  disobedience,  fall  short  of  the 
heavenly  rest. 

Christ  is  not  only  far  above  the  old  mediums  of 
revelation;  he  is  far  superior  to  the  old  priests. 
This  is  a  difficult  matter  to  explain  to  the  Romans, 
who  for  all  their  long  experience  as  Christians,  in 
view  of  which  they  ought  to  be  teaching  and  leading 
the  churches,  are  still  no  better  than  infants  as  far 


go      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

as  intellectual  or  spiritual  development  is  con- 
cerned. Only  let  them  remember  that  persons 
who  have  once  had  the  Christian  experience  and 
who  then  give  it  up  can  never  recover  it.  It  is 
impossible  to  renew  them  again  unto  repentance. 
Surely  none  of  the  Christians  at  Rome  will  make 
this  irreparable  mistake.  Their  faithful  service  of 
helpfulness  to  their  needy  brethren  has  long  com- 
mended them  to  God ;  they  must  not  give  up  now, 
but  hold  fast  to  the  end. 

To  show  his  readers  the  extraordinary  value  of 
what  they  are  in  danger  of  throwing  away,  the 
writer  proceeds  to  explain  to  them  the  messianic 
priesthood  of  Christ  and  its  superiority  to  the  old 
Jewish  priesthood.  In  doing  this  he  uses  the  Old 
Testament  in  the  fanciful  Alexandrian  manner, 
treating  it  allegorically  and  typically.  This  en- 
ables him  to  find  in  the  Old  Testament  evidence 
that  Jesus  is  the  final  and  eternal  high  priest,  of  an 
order  older  than  Aaron  and  even  than  Abraham. 
His  ministry  is  correspondingly  superior  to  that  of 
the  Jewish  priests.  They  had  to  offer  over  and 
over  again,  in  a  tent  that  was  at  best  only  a  copy 
of  the  heavenly  sanctuary,  the  same  material 
and  ineffectual  sacrifices.  But  Christ  as  messi- 
anic high  priest  has  offered  once  for  all  in  the 
heavenly  sanctuary  the  supreme  sacrifice  of 
himself  and  taken  his  seat  at  the  right  hand  of 
God. 


The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  91 

With  this  novel  and  ingenious  interpretation  of 
Jesus'  religious  significance  the  writer  couples  the 
practical  lesson  of  drawing  near  to  God  through 
the  new  and  living  way  which  Jesus  has  opened. 
He  again  exhorts  the  Romans  to  keep  fast  hold  of 
their  Christian  hope.  He  who  has  promised  is 
faithful;  already  they  can  see  the  Day  drawing 
near.  To  return  to  a  life  of  sin  after  having  once 
experienced  the  Christian  salvation- is  to  forfeit 
that  salvation  forever  and  to  incur  penalties  too 
dreadful  to  utter.  It  is  a  fearful  thing  to  fall 
into  the  hands  of  the  living  God.  They  must 
remember  the  heroic  devotion  they  showed  in 
former  days,  when  in  its  infancy  their  church 
endured  a  cruel  persecution  at  Nero's  hands.2 
That  same  boldness  and  endurance  they  must  still 
show. 

Through  all  the  history  of  God's  dealings  with 
men,  that  faculty  of  faith  by  which  men  have  laid 
firm  hold  on  the  unseen  realities  has  kept  patriarchs, 
prophets,  and  martyrs  steadfast  to  the  end.  These 
veterans  of  faith  are  now  looking  down  upon  their 
successors  at  Rome  to  see  them  run  with  endur- 
ance the  race  upon  which  they  have  started.  Christ 
himself  has  set  the  supreme  example  of  faith.  In 
all  the  trials  and  hardships  that  they  are  enduring 
the  Romans  must  learn  to  see  God's  paternal 
discipline,  by  which  the  lives  and  characters  of 
his  sons  are  to  be  perfected. 


92      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

In  a  final  impassioned  utterance  the  writer  re- 
turns to  the  thought  with  which  he  began.  The 
new  covenant  and  mediator  are  far  above  their 
old  Jewish  prototypes,  and  disloyalty  to  them  is 
attended  with  proportionately  greater  peril.  Our 
God  is  a  consuming  fire. 

Exhortations  and  warnings  conclude  the  letter. 
The  Romans  must  not  forget  the  noble  example 
of  their  first  martyr-teachers.  Considering  the 
issue  of  their  lives,  they  must  imitate  their  faith. 
They  must  avoid  false  teachings  and  practices,  and 
be  thankful  and  beneficent.  The  writer  closes  his 
hortatory  discourse,  as  he  calls  it,3  with  the  news 
of  Timothy's  release  from  prison,  promises  to  visit 
them  soon,  and  sends  salutations  from  himself  and 
the  Italian  brethren  who  are  with  him. 

The  language  of  Hebrews  shows  more  elegance 
and  finish  than  that  of  any  other  book  of  the  New 
Testament.  Its  author  was  a  trained  student  and 
thinker.  What  he  wrote  is  so  eloquent  as  to  be 
more  like  an  oration  than  a  letter,  and  the  absence 
of  any  superscription  such  as  letters  usually  have 
makes  it  seem  all  the  more  oratorical.  It  is  worth 
noting  that  the  Judaism  which  the  writer  has  in 
mind  is  always  that  of  the  tabernacle  in  the  wilder- 
ness, never  that  of  the  temple  in  Jerusalem.  In 
showing  the  superiority  of  Christ's  covenant  and 
revelation,  he  first  among  Christian  writers  makes 
free  use  of  that  allegorical  interpretation  of  the 


The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  93 

Old  Testament  which  has  had  such  grave  conse- 
quences in  Christian  history.  Hebrews  may  be 
regarded  as  the  supreme  effort  of  early  Christianity 
to  state  the  religious  significance  of  Jesus  in  Jewish 
terms— "mediator,"  "high  priest,"  "Messiah."  It 
is  interesting  to  observe  that  the  Roman  church 
bravely  withstood  the  attack  of  Domitian  and  in 
the  century  that  followed  made  an  earnest  effort 
to  teach  and  lead  its  sister  churches  in  a  way 
worthy  of  its  opportunities  and  its  history. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR  STUDY 

i.  References:  x  Tacitus,  .4  wnakxv. 44;  JHeb.  10:32-35; 
3Heb.  13:22. 

2.  Consider  Heb.  10:32-34  as  a  picture  of  the  experi- 
ences of  the  Roman  Christians  during  Nero's  persecution. 
Compare  with  it  Tacitus'  account,  especially  these  sentences: 
"First  those  were  seized  who  confessed  that  they  were 
Christians.  Next  on  their  information  a  vast  multitude 
were  convicted,  not  so  much  on  the  charge  of  burning  the 
city,  as  of  hating  the  human  race.  And  in  their  deaths 
they  were  also  made  the  subjects  of  sport,  for  they  were 
covered  with  the  hides  of  wild  beasts  and  worried  to  death 
by  dogs  or  nailed  to  crosses  or  set  fire  to  and  when  day 
declined  burned  to  serve  for  nocturnal  lights.  Nero  offered 
his  own  gardens  for  the  spectacle." — Tacitus,  Annals  xv.44 
(translation  in  Harper's  Classical  Library). 

3.  Note  the  stately,  often  rhetorical,  language  of  He- 
brews, for  example,  1:1-4;  chap.  11;  12:1,2. 

4.  Note  that  Hebrews  calls  itself  a  hortatory  discourse, 
"the  word  of  exhortation,"  13:22.  Can  it  be  a  Christian 
sermon  afterward  sent  to  another  congregation  as  a  letter? 


94      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

5.  In  this  case  would  the  personal  references  and  appeals 
appropriate  to  one  circle  be  appropriate  also  to  the  other  ? 

6.  Notice  the  successive  comparisons  of  Christ  with  (1) 
the  angels,  who  were  in  Jewish  thought  the  mediums  of 
revelation,  chaps.  1,  2;  (2)  with  Moses,  3:1-6;  (3)  with 
Joshua,  4 : 8-1 1 ;  (4)  with  Aaron,  7 : 1 1-28. 

7.  Read  8 : 1 — 10 :  39,  observing  the  argument  that  Christ 
performs  a  priestly  service  of  a  higher  type  than  that  of  the 
Jewish  priests. 

8.  Read  chaps.  11,  12,  noting  the  writer's  idea  of  faith 
as  the  faculty  of  laying  hold  on  the  unseen,  and  his  argu- 
ment that  his  readers  should,  like  the  heroes  of  faith,  find 
in  their  trials  the  discipline  of  their  faith. 

9.  Notice  the  frequent  paragraphs  of  practical  exhorta- 
tion: 2:1-4;  3:12-14;  4:1,2,11,14-16;  6:11,12. 

10.  What  is  the  writer's  view  of  those  who  have  given 
up  their  faith  in  Christ  and  apostatized?  Cf.  6:4-6; 
10:26-31. 

11.  Who  were  the  martyr-teachers  of  the  Roman  church 
whose  example  the  writer  commends  to  the  Romans  in  13 : 7  ? 

12.  Notice  the  rebuke  of  ascetic  practices  in  the  com- 
mendation of  marriage,  13:4,  and  the  reference  to  meats, 

13:9- 

13.  Notice  the  continued  use  of  somewhat  extended  let- 
ters in  the  life  of  the  early  church.  Had  Paul's  example 
something  to  do  with  this  ? 


CHAPTER  XIV 
THE  FIRST  EPISTLE  OF  PETER 

The  Empire's  condemnation  put  a  peculiar 
strain  upon  the  churches  all  over  the  Roman  world. 
The  ignorant  masses  already  regarded  the  Chris- 
tians as  depraved  and  vicious  and  credited  them 
with  eating  human  flesh  and  with  other  monstrous 
practices.  But  quite  aside  from  this  the  Empire 
had  adjudged  being  a  Christian  a  crime  punishable 
by  death.  The  Christian  had  neither  the  protec- 
tion of  the  state  nor  the  sympathy  of  his  fellows. 

In  this  situation  a  Christian  elder  of  Rome  wrote 
to  his  brethren  throughout  Asia  Minor  a  letter  of 
advice  and  encouragement.  Perhaps  the  Epistle 
to  the  Hebrews  had  already  reached  Rome  and  its 
ringing  challenge  to  the  Romans  to  be  teachers 
stirred  him  to  write.1  He  styles  himself  a  witness 
of  Christ's  sufferings,  which  may  mean  that  he  was 
himself  a  Christian  confessor,  that  is,  one  who  had 
risked  his  life  by  acknowledging  his  faith  before  the 
authorities.*  He  sends  to  the  Christians  of  the 
chief  provinces  of  Asia  Minor  a  message  of  hope. 
They  already  enjoy  a  salvation  of  unutterable 
worth,  and  have  awaiting  them  in  heaven  an  im- 
perishable inheritance.    All  their  present  trials  are 

95 


96      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

to  prove  and  refine  their  faith.  As  Christians  they 
are  to  live  lives  of  holiness  and  love.  By  their  pure 
and  unobjectionable  conduct  they  must  disarm 
the  public  suspicion  of  their  practices.  They  must 
obey  the  emperor  and  his  appointed  governors. 
Government  is  for  the  restraint  of  evildoers  and 
for  the  encouragement  of  the  good.  The  example 
of  Christ's  sufferings  should  encourage  servants 
when  they  are  mistreated  to  imitate  his  patience 
and  self-command.  All  must  cultivate  sympathy, 
humility,  and  love. 

No  one  can  reasonably  molest  them  if  they  live 
uprightly,  but  if  they  should  suffer  for  their  very 
righteousness  they  would  be  only  the  more  blessed. 
It  is  better  to  suffer  for  welldoing  than  for  evil- 
doing.  They  must  not  be  afraid,  but  be  ready  to 
give  respectful  and  honest  answers  to  magistrates 
who  examine  them,  f*  1  by  their  uprightness  of  life 
must  silence  and  condemn  the  popular  calumnies. 
Christ  too  suffered  to  bring  them  to  God,  and  they 
must  live  the  new  Christian  life  which  he  opened 
to  them,  not  their  old  gross  heathen  life  of  sin. 

The  fiery  trial  to  which  they  are  now  exposed 
must  not  be  thought  strange.  Through  it  they 
may  share  in  Christ's  sufferings,  and  so  in  his 
coming  glory  too.  It  is  a  privilege  to  endure  re- 
proach for  the  name  of  Christ.  To  be  punished 
for  committing  crime  carries  disgrace  along  with 
it,  but  to  endure  punishment  for  being  a  Christian 


The  First  Epistle  of  Peter  97 

does  honor  to  God.  They  can  only  commit  their 
lives  to  God,  and  keep  on  doing  what  is  right. 

Their  elders  must  do  their  work  in  a  noble  and 
high-minded  way,  as  true  shepherds  of  the  flock  of 
God  under  the  chief  shepherd  Christ.  They  must 
all  humble  themselves  under  God's  mighty  hand, 
and  he  will  in  his  good  time  lift  them  up  again. 
Everywhere  their  Christian  brethren  are  being 
compelled  to  endure  this  same  bitter  experience. 
God  is  the  source  of  all  their  help,  and  after  they 
have  suffered  a  little  while  he  will  give  them  de- 
liverance. 

Among  the  messages  which  conclude  the  letter 
is  one  from  the  church  at  Rome — here  as  in  the 
Revelation  called  Babylon — in  which  the  writer 
is  an  elder.3  Who  he  was  it  is  not  possible  to  say; 
but  in  later  times,  when  the  name  of  Peter  was 
being  connected  with  the  Roman  church,  he  nat- 
urally came  to  be  considered  the  author  of  the  hrst 
great  Christian  letter,  after  Paul,  that  had  gone  out 
from  Rome.  Hebrews  and  First  John  do  not  name 
their  writers,  but  the  titles  given  these  books  in  most 
Bibles  ascribe  them  to  definite  authors,  and  some- 
thing like  this  probably  happened  to  First  Peter. 
But,  whoever  wrote  it,  it  gave  the  imperiled  Chris- 
tians all  through  Asia  Minor  a  message  of  hope  and 
courage  during  the  persecution  of  Domitian,  pointed 
out  the  difference  between  suffering  for  being  a 
criminal  and  suffering  for  being  a  Christian,  and 


98      The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

inspired  them  to  overcome  by  lives  of  purity  and 
goodness  the  hatred  and  slanders  of  the  heathen 
world. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR  STUDY 

i.  References:  xHeb.  5:12;  »I  Pet.  5:1;  3Rev.  17:5,  6,9. 

2.  Read  First  Peter  through,  and  imagine  its  effect  upon 
the  persecuted  Christians  of  Asia  Minor. 

3.  Notice  the  districts  of  Asia  Minor  in  which  Chris- 
tianity was  already  established,  1:1.  Consider  whether  the 
order  in  which  they  are  mentioned  is  that  in  which  the 
bearer  of  the  letter  would  naturally  visit  them. 

4.  Which  of  these  had  Paul  evangelized  ? 

5.  In  view  of  the  hostile  attitude  of  the  Empire,  how  do 
you  explain  the  loyal  tone  of  the  letter,  2:13-17  ? 

6.  How  does  this  compare  with  the  attitude  of  the 
writer  of  the  Revelation,  in  the  same  general  circumstances  ? 

7.  What  does  the  writer  imply  in  speaking  of  Rome  as 
Babylon,  5:13? 

8.  Notice  the  help  for  the  situation  of  his  readers  found 
by  the  writer  in  the  suffering  of  Christ,  3:18;  4:1. 

9.  Observe  the  emphasis  upon  suffering  "as  a  Chris- 
tian," 4:15,  16.  Was  this  a  new  thing?  The  victims  of 
Nero's  persecution  had  suffered  under  the  charge  of  being 
incendiaries  or  haters  of  the  human  race. 

10.  What  picture  of  church  life  and  of  Christian  morals 
does  the  letter  give  ? 

11.  Note  that  four  ancient  documents  relate  to  Domi- 
tian's  persecution  in  Rome  and  Asia  Minor:  Revelation, 
Hebrews,  First  Clement,  and  First  Peter. 

12.  Observe  the  strange  idea  that  Christ  had  preached 
to  the  dead,  which  first  appears  in  I  Pet.  3: 18-20;  4:6. 

13.  On  Christianity  in  Bithynia  (1  : 1)  read  Pliny's  letter 
to  Trajan   (x.97)   written  about   11a   a.d.,  a  few  years 


The  First  Epistle  of  Peter  99 

after  First  Peter.  Pliny  inquires  of  the  emperor  "whether 
the  very  profession  of  Christianity  unattended  with  any 
criminal  act,  or  only  the  crimes  themselves  attaching  to 
the  profession  are  punishable An  anonymous  infor- 
mation was  laid  before  me  containing  a  charge  against 
several  persons  who  upon  examination  denied  that  they 
were  Christians  or  had  ever  been  so.  They  repeated  after 
me  an  invocation  to  the  gods  and  offered  religious  rites 
with  wine  and  incense  before  your  image,  which  for  that 
purpose  I  had  ordered  to  be  brought,  together  with  those 
of  the  gods,  and  even  reviled  the  name  of  Christ,  whereas 
there  is,  it  is  said,  no  forcing  those  who  are  really 
Christians  into  any  of  these  compliances.  I  thought  it 
proper  therefore  to  discharge  them."  Some  who  had  been 
Christians  "affirmed  that  the  whole  of  their  guilt  or  their 
error  had  been  that  they  met  on  a  stated  day  before  it 
was  light  and  addressed  a  form  of  prayer  to  Christ  as  to  a 
divinity,  binding  themselves  by  a  solemn  oath  not  for  the 
purposes  of  any  wicked  design,  but  never  to  commit  any 
fraud,  theft,  or  adultery,  never  to  falsify  their  word  nor  to 
deny  a  trust  when  they  should  be  called  upon  to  deliver  it 
up;  after  which  it  was  their  custom  to  separate  and  then 
reassemble  to  eat  in  common  a  harmless  meal.  From  this 
custom,  however,  they  desisted  after  the  publication  of  my 
edict  by  which  according  to  your  commands  I  forbade  the 
meeting  of  any  assemblies.  After  receiving  this  account  I 
judged  it  so  much  the  more  necessary  to  extort  the  real 
truth  by  putting  to  the  torture  two  female  slaves  who  were 
said  to  officiate  in  their  religious  rites,  but  all  I  could  dis- 
cover was  evidence  of  an  absurd  and  extravagant  supersti- 
tion. .  .  .  ." — Pliny,  Letters  x.  97  (Bosanquet's  translation 
in  Bonn's  Classical  Library). 


CHAPTER  XV 
THE  EPISTLE  OF  JAMES 

The  ancient  world  was  full  of  preachers.  Dressed 
in  a  rough  cloak,  one  would  take  his  stand  at  some 
street  corner  and  amuse  and  instruct,  with  his  easy, 
animated  talk,  the  chance  crowd  that  gathered 
about  him.  He  would  mingle  question  and  answer, 
apostrophe,  dialogue,  invective,  and  anecdote, 
urging  his  little  congregation  to  fortitude  and  self- 
control,  the  great  ideals  of  the  Stoic  teachers.  For 
these  street  preachers  of  ancient  times  were  Stoics, 
and  their  sermons  were  called  diatribes. 

Christian  preachers  had  to  compete  with  these 
men  for  the  attention  of  the  people  they  were  trying 
to  convert  to  Christianity,  and  they  naturally 
adopted  some  of  their  methods.  In  the  market- 
place at  Athens  Paul  did  this  informal  open-air 
preaching  every  day,  and  in  doing  so  came  into 
conflict  with  some  of  these  Stoic  preachers.1  A 
later  Stoic,  Justin,  became  a  Christian,  and  tells 
us  in  his  Dialogue  with  Trypho  how  he  continued 
to  practice  this  way  of  preaching  on  the  promenade 
at  Ephesus. 

We  cannot  help  wishing  that  one  of  these  street 
sermons  had  been  preserved  to  us  just  as  its  author 
gave  it,  and  of  course  we  have  in  the  Book  of  Acts 
reports  of  several  sermons  of  Stephen,  Peter,  and 

IOO 


The  Epistle  of  James  ioi 

Paul.  It  is  true  that  Luke  was  not  present  when 
most  of  these  were  uttered,  and  probably  had  to 
fill  out  somewhat  any  outline  or  report  which 
had  come  to  him;  but  this  only  means  that  the 
sermon,  if  not  exactly  what  Paul  or  Peter  said,  is 
what  another  early  Christian  preacher,  Luke, 
would  have  said,  or  supposes  Paul  would  have 
said,  in  those  circumstances.  But  we  have  in  the 
New  Testament  at  least  one  ancient  sermon  pre- 
served for  its  own  sake  and  not  as  an  incidental 
part  of  a  historical  narrative.  It  is  the  book  we 
know  as  the  Epistle  of  James. 

In  James  the  Christian  preacher  tells  his  hearers 
that  life's  trials,  vicissitudes,  and  temptations  will 
perfect  character,  if  they  are  met  in  dependence 
upon  God.  But  his  hearers  must  not  merely 
profess  religion,  but  really  practice  purity  and 
humanity.  They  must  be  doers  that  work,  not 
hearers  that  forget.  They  must  learn  to  respect 
the  poor,  and  to  feed  and  clothe  the  needy.  Their 
faith  must  show  itself  in  works.  They  must  not 
be  too  eager  to  teach  and  direct  one  another. 
The  tongue  is  the  hardest  thing  in  the  world  to 
tame.  If  they  wish  to  show  their  wisdom,  let  them 
do  it  by  a  life  of  good  works.  They  must  give  up 
their  greed,  indulgence,  and  worldliness,  their  cen- 
soriousness  and  self-confidence.  Their  rich  oppres- 
sors are  doomed  to  punishment;  only  they  must 
be  patient,  like  Job  and  the  prophets.    Above  all 


102    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

things,  they  must  refrain  from  oaths.  In  trouble 
and  sickness  they  must  pray  for  one  another.  The 
prayer  of  a  righteous  man  avails  much.  And  they 
must  seek  to  convert  sinners,  for  God  especially 
blesses  such  work. 

These  are  the  teachings  of  this  ancient  sermon. 
What  is  the  connection  between  them  ?  Do  they 
constitute  a  chain  of  thought?  Are  they  beads 
on  a  string,  or  simply  a  handful  of  pearls  ?  As  an 
example  of  Christian  preaching  this  sermon  is  not 
at  all  doctrinal  or  intellectual.  Little  is  said  even 
of  Christ.  The  whole  emphasis  is  practical.  The 
preacher's  interest  is  in  conduct,  in  the  words  and 
acts  of  his  hearers.  He  does  not  care  especially 
about  their  theological  views.  For  him  the  only 
real  faith  is  that  which  shows  itself  in  good  deeds. 
Honest,  upright,  and  helpful  living  is  what  the 
preacher  demands,  and  he  does  so  with  a  directness 
and  a  frankness  never  since  surpassed.  It  is  this 
that  has  given  this  fifteen-minute  sermon  its  abid- 
ing place  in  Christian  literature. 

Where  this  sermon  was  first  preached  it  is  im- 
possible to  say.  It  would  have  been  appropriate 
almost  anywhere.  That  is  the  beauty  of  it.  But 
we  may  be  sure  that  it  was  as  a  sermon  and  not  as  a 
letter  that  it  first  appeared.  It  contains  none  of 
those  unmistakable  epistolary  touches  that  we  find 
for  example  in  Galatians  and  Second  and  Third 
John.    It  does  not  end  with  a  farewell  or  benedic- 


The  Epistle  of  James  103 

tion  as  so  many  New  Testament  letters  do.  Only 
the  salutation  contained  in  the  first  verse  suggests  a 
letter:  "James,  a  servant  of  God  and  of  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ,  to  the  twelve  tribes  which  are  of  the 
Dispersion,  greeting." 

But  a  moment's  reflection  will  show  that  this 
does  not  prove  the  Epistle  of  James  to  be  a  letter. 
How  would  one  go  about  delivering  it  "to  the 
twelve  tribes  which  are  of  the  Dispersion,"  that  is, 
to  the  Jews  scattered  about  through  the  Greco- 
Roman  world  from  Babylon  to  Spain  ?  Or,  if  the 
Dispersion  is  meant  in  a  figurative  sense,  to  all 
the  Christians  outside  of  Palestine  ?  It  is  clear  at 
once  that  these  words  are  not  the  salutation  of  a 
letter  but  a  kind  of  dedication  for  a  published  work. 
That  the  Epistle  of  James  was  written  to  be  thus 
published,  however,  that  is,  that  it  is  an  "epistle" 
in  the  literary  sense  of  the  word,  is  very  improbable 
in  view  of  its  contents,  which  relate  to  no  single 
subject  or  situation. 

It  can  surely  be  no  cause  for  surprise  or  incredu- 
lity that  we  possess  among  the  twenty-seven  books 
of  the  New  Testament  one  representative  of  the 
commonest  type  of  Christian  literature,  the  ser- 
mon. It  would  be  a  wonder  if  this  were  not  the 
case.  Like  thousands  of  other  sermons,  it  was  not 
only  preached  but  published,  with  a  dedication, 
boldly  figurative,  to  Christians  everywhere.  The 
unidentified  James  whose  name  is  prefixed  to  it 


104    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

may  have  been  its  author  or  its  publisher,  or  sim- 
ply one  in  whose  name  it  was  put  forth.  The 
early  church  sought  to  recognize  in  him  Jesus' 
brother,  who,  though  not  an  apostle,  became  the 
head  of  the  church  at  Jerusalem;2  but  if  he  was 
the  preacher,  the  sermon's  reticence  about  Jesus 
would  be  doubly  hard  to  understand. 

There  is  something  very  modern  about  this  so- 
called  Epistle  of  James.  Its  interest  in  democracy, 
philanthropy,  and  social  justice  strikes  a  responsive 
chord  in  our  time.  The  preacher's  simplicity  and 
directness,  his  impatience  with  cant  and  sham  and 
his  satirical  skill  in  exposing  them,  his  noble  advo- 
cacy of  the  rights  of  labor  and  his  clear  perception 
of  the  sterling  Christian  virtues  that  were  to  win 
the  world,  justify  the  place  of  honor  his  sermon 
has  in  the  New  Testament. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR  STUDY 

i.  References:  l  Acts  17:17,  18;  *  Gal.  1:19;  2:12. 

2.  Is  the  teaching  of  James  as  to  faith  and  works  incom- 
patible with  Paul's  teaching  as  to  faith,  or  only  different 
from  it  in  emphasis  ? 

3.  What  did  Paul  mean  by  "works,"  and  what  does  the 
letter  of  James  mean  ? 

4.  Are  the  rich  oppressors  of  5 : 1-6  worldly  Christians, 
or  is  the  passage  an  apostrophe  in  which  the  preacher  con- 
demns the  luxury  and  heartlessness  of  the  pagan  world? 
Cf.  2:6,  7. 

5.  What  evils  does  the  letter  principally  attack  ? 

6.  What  are  its  chief  religious  teachings  ? 


The  Epistle  of  James  105 

7.  Do  the  practical  teachings  of  the  letter  resemble  those 
of  Jesus  as  we  know  them  from  the  Gospels,  and  if  so,  which 
ones? 

8.  Read  it  through  aloud  at  a  single  reading,  and  imagine 
its  effect  upon  a  first-century  company  of  Christians  in  some 
house  in  Rome  or  Corinth. 

9.  Do  you  observe  in  James  any  traces  of  the  preacher's 
acquaintance  with  First  Peter  ? 

10.  Compare  James  with  typical  prophetic  sermons, 
Amos,  chaps.  1,  2;  Isa.,  chap.  1  or  chap.  5  or  8:1 — 10:4  or 
chaps.  18,  19,  the  sermon  on  Egypt. 

11.  Compare  with  James  a  discourse  of  Epictetus:  for 
example,  i,  3,  i,  16,  or  the  following:  "Have  you  not  God? 
Do  you  seek  any  other  while  you  have  him  ?  Or  will  he  tell 
you  any  other  than  these  things  ?  If  you  were  a  statue  of 
Phidias,  either  Zeus  or  Athena,  you  would  remember  both 
yourself  and  the  artist,  and  if  you  had  any  sense  you  would 
endeavor  to  do  nothing  unworthy  of  him  who  formed  you 
or  of  yourself,  nor  to  appear  in  an  unbecoming  manner  to 
spectators.  And  are  you  now  careless  how  you  appear  be- 
cause you  are  the  workmanship  of  Zeus?  And  yet  what 
comparison  is  there  either  between  the  artists  or  the  things 
they  have  formed?  ....  Being  then  the  formation  of 
such  an  artist,  will  you  dishonor  him,  especially  when  he 
has  not  only  formed  but  intrusted  and  given  to  you  the 
guardianship  of  yourself?  Will  you  not  only  be  forgetful 
of  this  but  moreover  dishonor  the  trust  ?  If  God  had  com- 
mitted some  orphan  to  your  charge,  would  you  have  been 
thus  careless  of  him?  He  has  delivered  yourself  to  your 
care,  and  says,  'I  had  no  one  fitter  to  be  trusted  than  you. 
Preserve  this  person  for  me  such  as  he  is  by  nature;  modest, 
faithful,  sublime,  unterrified,  dispassionate,  tranquil.'  And 
will  you  not  preserve  him?" — Epictetus,  Discourses  iL  8 
(Carter's  translation). 


CHAPTER  XVI 
THE  LETTERS  OF  JOHN 

About  the  beginning  of  the  second  century  a 
disagreement  arose  among  the  Christians  of  Asia. 
It  was  about  the  reality  of  the  life  and  death  of 
Jesus.  How  could  the  Messiah,  the  Son  of  God, 
possessed  of  a  divine  nature  so  utterly  removed 
from  matter,  have  lived  a  life  of  human  limitation 
and  suffered  a  shameful  and  agonizing  death  ? 

It  was  a  favorite  idea  in  ancient  thought  that 
the  material  universe  was  intrinsically  evil,  or  at 
least  opposed  to  goodness,  and  that  God,  being 
wholly  good,  could  not  come  into  any  direct  con- 
tact with  it,  for  such  contact,  it  was  thought, 
would  infect  God  with  the  evil  inherent  in  all 
matter.  This  idea  was  held  by  some  Christians 
who  at  the  same  time  accepted  Jesus  as  the 
divine  Messiah.  From  this  contradiction  they  es- 
caped in  part  by  claiming  that  Jesus'  divine  nature 
or  messiahship  descended  on  him  at  his  baptism 
and  left  him  just  before  his  death  on  the  cross. 
They  inferred  that  his  sufferings  were  only  seeming 
and  not  real,  and  from  this  idea  they  were  known  as 
Docetists,  that  is,  "seemists." 

The  Docetists  were  probably  better  educated  to 
begin  with  than  most  Christians,  and  their  profes- 

m6 


The  Letters  of  John  107 

sion  of  these  semi-philosophical  views  of  Christ's 
life  and  death  still  further  separated  them  from 
ordinary  people.  This  separation  was  increased  by 
the  claim  they  made  of  higher  enlightenment, 
closer  mystic  fellowship  with  God,  clearer  knowl- 
edge of  truth,  and  freedom  from  sin.  Expressions 
like  "I  have  fellowship  with  God,"  "I  know  him," 
"I  have  no  sin,"  "I  am  in  the  light,"  were  often 
on  their  lips.  Both  their  spiritual  pretensions  and 
their  fantastic  view  of  Christ  made  them  an  un- 
wholesome influence  in  the  Asian  churches  and 
roused  more  than  one  Christian  writer  to  dispute 
their  claims. 

There  lived  at  that  time  in  Asia  a  Christian 
leader  of  such  influence  and  reputation  that  he 
could  in  his  correspondence  style  himself  simply 
"the  Elder."  Wide  as  his  influence  must  have 
been,  there  were  some  who  withstood  his  authority 
and  refused  to  further  his  enterprises.  With  his 
approval  missionaries  had  gone  out  through  Asia 
to  extend  the  gospel  among  the  Greek  population. 
Some  Christians  had  welcomed  them  hospitably 
and  helped  them  on  their  way,  but  others  who 
were  hostile  to  the  Elder  had  refused  to  receive 
them  and  had  threatened  any  who  did  so  with 
exclusion  from  the  church. 

In  this  situation  the  Elder  writes  two  letters. 
One,  known  to  us  as  Third  John,  is  to  a  certain 
Gaius,  to  acknowledge  his  support  and  encourage 


108    Tee  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

him  to  continue  it,  and  to  warn  him  against 'the 
party  of  Diotrephes.  Gaius  is  probably  the  most 
influential  of  the  Elder's  friends  and  supporters  in 
his  own  community,  while  Diotrephes  is  the  leader 
of  the  party  hostile  to  the  Elder.  The  letter 
is  probably  delivered  by  Demetrius,  one  of  the 
missionaries  in  question.  At  the  same  time  the 
Elder  writes  another  short  letter,  our  Second  John, 
to  the  church  to  which  Gaius  belongs,  urging  its 
members  to  love  one  another  and  to  live  harmo- 
niously together,  and  warning  them  against  the 
deceivers  who  teach  that  Christ  has  not  come  in 
the  flesh.  The  advocates  of  this  teaching  they  are 
to  let  severely  alone,  refusing  them  even  the  ordi- 
nary salutations  and  the  hospitality  usual  among 
Christians.  The  two  letters  are  brief,  for  the 
Elder  is  coming  to  them  very  soon  in  person;  but 
short  as  they  are  they  bring  us  into  the  very  heart 
of  a  controversy  that  was  already  dividing  indi- 
vidual churches  and  threatening  the  peace  of  a 
whole  district. 

As  missionaries  like  Demetrius  went  about  the 
province  of  Asia,  under  the  Elder's  direction,  they 
took  with  them  a  longer  letter  from  his  pen  in 
which  the  same  pressing  matters  were  more  fully 
presented.  We  have  seen  that  the  short  letters 
are  without  his  name,  and  the  long  letter  bears 
not  even  his  title.  It  hardly  required  it  if  it  was 
to  be  carried  by  his  messengers  and  read  by  them 


The  Letters  of  John  109 

as  from  him  in  the  assembled  churches  they  visited. 
This  longer  letter,  known  to  us  as  First  John,  deals 
with  the  same  question  as  Second  John,  takes  the 
same  view  of  the  matter,  and  puts  it  with  the  same 
confident  authority.  But  the  situation  has  devel- 
oped somewhat,  for  the  Docetists,  or  some  of  them, 
have  now  left  the  church.1 

The  Elder  begins  with  the  most  confident 
emphasis.  His  own  experience  guarantees  the 
truth  of  his  message,  which  he  is  sending  in  order 
that  his  readers  may  share  the  fellowship  with 
God  and  Christ  which  he  enjoys.2  The  heart  of 
that  message  is  that  God  was  historically  mani- 
fested in  the  life  of  Christ,  and  that  the  Christian 
experience  is  fully  sufficient  for  anyone's  spiritual 
needs.  To  claim  fellowship  with  God  and  live  an 
evil  life  will  not  do;  the  claim  is  false.  The  Do- 
cetic  pretension  to  sinlessness  is  mere  deceit.  The 
Christian  way  is  to  own  one's  sins  and  seek  for- 
giveness. 

The  claim  of  knowing  Christ  is  meaningless 
apart  from  obedience  to  his  commands.  Living  as 
he  lived  is  the  only  evidence  of  union  with  him. 
Those  who  claim  peculiar  illumination  and  yet 
treat  their  brethren  with  exclusiveness  and  con- 
tempt show  that  they  have  never  risen  to  a  really 
Christian  attitude.  The  Elder's  reason  for  writing 
to  his  friends  is  that  they  have  laid  the  foundation 
of  a  real  Christian  experience,  and  he  would  warn 


no    The  Story  or  the  New  Testament 

them  against  sinking  again  into  a  life  of  worldliness 
and  sin. 

The  breach  with  the  Docetic  thinkers,  with 
their  claims  of  freedom  from  sin,  is  complete.  It 
is  well  that  they  have  left  the  church,  for  they  have 
no  right  to  be  in  it.  Those  who  deny  that  Jesus 
is  the  Christ  are  not  Christians  but  antichrists.  In 
opposition  to  their  teachings,  true  Christians  should 
continue  to  cultivate  that  spiritual  experience  upon 
which  they  have  entered.  They  must  abide  in 
Christ  and  following  the  guidance  of  the  Spirit 
seek,  as  children  of  a  righteous  heavenly  father,  to 
be  righteous  like  him.  Righteousness  and  love  are 
the  marks  of  the  Christian  life.  Jesus  in  laying 
down  his  life  for  us  has  shown  what  love  may  be. 

Some  who  urge  the  Docetic  teaching  claim  that 
the  Holy  Spirit  in  their  hearts  has  indorsed  it. 
But  the  Spirit  of  God  authorizes  no  such  teaching. 
Only  spirits  that  confess  that  Jesus  Christ  is  come 
in  the  flesh  are  of  God.  Spirits  that  deny  this  are 
of  the  world.  The  Elder  declares  that  he  is  of  God, 
and  that  all  who  really  know  God  will  obey  his 
solemn  warning  against  these  spirits  of  antichrist.3 

Love  is  the  perfect  bond  in  all  this  great  spiritual 
fellowship.  Love  is  of  God  and  God  is  love.  He 
has  shown  it  by  sending  his  Son  into  the  world  to 
give  us  life.  We  love  because  he  first  loved  us.  If 
he  so  loved  us,  we  also  ought  to  love  one  another. 
Belief  in  Jesus  as  the  Christ  is  the  sign  of  sonship 


The  Letters  of  John  hi 

to  God  and  the  way  to  the  life  of  love,  since  it 
is  the  manifestation  in  Jesus  of  God's  love  that 
kindles  love  in  us.  The  messiahship  of  Jesus  is  evi- 
denced not  only  by  the  voice  of  the  Spirit,  but  by 
his  human  life  and  death.  There  are  three  who 
bear  witness,  the  Spirit,  and  the  water,  and  the 
blood.  The  witness  is  this,  that  God  has  given  us 
eternal  life  and  this  life  is  in  his  Son.  To  have  the 
life  we  must  see  in  Jesus  the  Christ,  the  indispen- 
sable revelation  of  God. 

The  Elder  writes  to  confirm  his  readers  in  their 
assurance  of  eternal  life.  Sonship  to  God  means 
the  renunciation  of  sin.  The  Christian  has  an 
inward  assurance  that  he  belongs  to  God,  whom 
Jesus  has  revealed.  Here  is  the  true  God  and 
eternal  life. 

Except  for  a  few  touches  which  mark  it  very 
definitely  as  a  letter  (2:12-14),  this  little  work 
might  pass  for  a  sermon  or  homily.  It  is  clearly  a 
circular  letter  written  to  save  the  churches  of  Asia 
from  the  Docetic  views  which  threatened  them. 
The  great  words  of  the  letter,  life,  light,  love,  figure 
importantly  in  the  Fourth  Gospel  also,  and  in  its 
meditative  and  yet  epigrammatic  style  the  letter 
resembles  the  Gospel.  It  has  been  said  that 
while  the  Gospel  argues  that  Jesus  is  the 
Christ,  the  letter  contends  that  the  Christ  is  Jesus, 
that  is,  the  Messiah  is  identical  with  the  historical 
Jesus. 


ii2    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Who  was  this  Asian  Elder  who  could  so  confi- 
dently instruct  and  command  the  churches  of  his 
countryside?  larly  Christian  writers  mention  an 
Elder  John  of  hphesus,  who  had  been  a  personal 
follower  of  Jesus  but  was  not  the  apostle  of  that 
name,  and  they  sometimes  refer  to  him  simply  as 
"the  Elder,"  just  as  the  writer  of  these  letters  calls 
himself.  There  is  no  need  to  identify  him  with 
the  prophet  John  of  the  Revelation.  But  to  John 
the  letters  have  always  been  ascribed,  and  we  may 
think  of  the  Elder  John  as  sending  them  out  from 
Ephesus,  one  to  Gaius,  one  to  the  church  to  which 
he  belonged,  and  one  to  that  and  other  churches, 
in  full  assurance  that  the  Christian  experience  and 
belief  in  Jesus  as  the  Christ  would  save  them  from 
the  mistakes  of  Docetism. 

SUGGESTIONS   FOE   STUDY 

1.  References:  XI  John  2 :  19;  *I  John  1 : 1-4;  3I  John  4:6. 

2.  Read  Third  John  as  an  example  of  a  personal  Chris- 
tian letter.  Compare  it  with  Paul's  letter  to  Philemon,  the 
only  other  one  of  this  kind  preserved  in  the  New  Testament, 

3.  Read  Second  John  as  an  example  of  a  letter  to  a 
church,  analogous  with  Paul's  letters  to  Thessalonica, 
Corinth,  or  Colossae.  How  does  it  compare  with  such 
letters  of  Paul  ? 

4.  Notice  in  First  John  the  emphasis  on  belief  in  Christ, 
2:23;  3:23;  4:15;  5:10-13.  How  does  this  compare  with 
the  teaching  of  James  ?    Yet  cf.  3 :  18. 

5.  Notice  the  writer's  attitude  to  the  world  as  over 
against  the  church,  2:15-17;  3:13;  5:19.  Is  there  anything 
like  this  in  James  ? 


The  Letters  of  John  113 

6.  Read  First  John,  noting  the  spiritual  claims  made  by 
the  Docetists  but  denied  by  the  writer,  1:6,  8,  10;  2:4,  9; 
4:20. 

7.  Has  the  reference  to  antichrists  in  2:18  anything  to 
do  with  what  Paul  wrote  of  in  Second  Thessalonians,  or 
is  it  merely  an  application  of  the  well-known  name  to  the 
new  and  immediate  foes  of  the  church  ? 

8.  Does  the  "going  out"  of  the  Elder's  opponents  from 
the  church,  2 :  19,  mark  the  beginning  of  the  rise  of  heretical 
bodies  professing  a  modified  Christianity  not  accepted  by 
the  church  at  large  ?  Consider  whether  the  Nicolaitans  of 
Rev.  2:6,  15  may  have  been  such  a  Christian  sect. 

9.  What  are  the  leading  religious  ideas  of  First  John? 

10.  Read  4:7-21,  comparing  it  with  Paul's  chapter  on 
love,  I  Cor.,  chap.  13. 

11.  The  letter  begins  with  basing  Christian  confidence  on 
Christian  experience,  1 : 1-4.  What  is  its  closing  emphasis, 
5: 18-21? 


CHAPTER  XVII 
THE  GOSPEL  ACCORDING  TO  JOHN 

Christianity  and  Judaism  had  parted  company. 
The  Christian  movement,  at  first  wholly  Jewish, 
had  after  a  little  tolerated  a  few  Greeks,  then  ad- 
mitted them  in  numbers,  and  at  length  found  itself 
almost  wholly  Greek.  The  Jewish  wing  of  the 
church  withered  and  disappeared.  The  Jews  closed 
up  their  ranks  and  disowned  the  church.  Church 
and  synagogue  were  at  war. 

It  was  plain  that  the  future  of  the  Christian 
movement  lay  among  the  Greeks,  the  Gentiles. 
To  them  it  must  more  than  ever  address  itself. 
Its  message  must  be  made  intelligible  to  them. 
But  the  forms  in  which  it  had  always  been  put  were 
Jewish.  Jesus  was  the  Messiah,  the  national  deliv- 
erer whose  coming  was  foretold  by  Jewish  prophets, 
and  who  was  destined  to  come  again  on  the  clouds 
of  heaven  in  fulfilment  of  the  messianic  drama  of 
Jewish  apocalyptic.  The  church  was  addressing  a 
Greek  world  in  a  Jewish  vocabulary.  Was  there 
no  universal  language  it  could  speak  ?  Was  no  one 
able  to  translate  the  gospel  into  universal  terms  ? 
The  Gospel  of  John  is  the  answer  to  this  demand. 

Early  in  the  second  century  a  Christian  leader 
of  Ephesus,  well  acquainted  with  the  early  Gospels 


The  Gospel  According  to  John       115 

and  deeply  influenced  by  the  letters  of  Paul,  put 
forth  a  new  interpretation  of  the  spiritual  signifi- 
cance of  Jesus  in  terms  of  Greek  thought.  Paul 
had  laid  great  emphasis  upon  faith  in  Jesus  the 
risen  Christ,  glorified  at  God's  right  hand,  and  had 
attached  little  importance  to  knowing  the  historical 
Jesus  in  Palestine.  His  Ephesian  follower  finds  in 
Paul's  glorified  Christ  the  divine  "Word"  of  Stoic 
philosophy,  and  reads  this  lofty  theological  con- 
ception back  into  the  earthly  life  of  Jesus.  The 
faith  Paul  demanded  becomes  with  him  primarily 
an  intellectual  assent  to  the  messiahship  of  Jesus 
thus  understood,  that  is,  to  the  revelation  in  the 
historical  Jesus  of  that  absolute  divine  will  and 
wisdom  toward  which  Greek  philosophy  had  always 
been  striving. 

The  form  in  which  this  Christian  theologian  put 
his  teaching  was  a  gospel  narrative.  He  did  not 
intend  it  to  supersede  the  familiar  narratives  of 
Matthew  and  Luke,  but  to  correct,  interpret,  and 
supplement  them.  The  new  narrative  differs  from 
the  older  ones  in  many  details.  In  it  Jesus'  ministry 
falls  almost  wholly  in  Judaea  instead  of  Galilee,  and 
seems  to  cover  three  years  instead  of  one.  The 
cleansing  of  the  temple  is  placed  at  the  beginning 
instead  of  at  the  end  of  his  work.  Nothing  is 
said  of  Jesus'  baptism,  temptation,  or  agony  in 
the  garden.  His  human  qualities  disappear,  and 
he  moves  through  the  successive  scenes  of  the 


u6    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Gospel,  perfect  master  of  every  situation,  until  at 
the  end  he  goes  of  his  own  accord  to  his  crucifixion 
and  death.  He  does  not  teach  in  parables,  and  his 
teaching  deals  not,  as  in  the  earlier  Gospels,  with 
the  Kingdom  of  God,  but  with  his  own  nature  and 
with  his  inward  relation  to  God.  In  his  debates 
with  the  Jews  he  defends  his  union  with  the  Father, 
his  pre-existence,  and  his  sinlessness.  He  welcomes 
the  interest  shown  by  Greeks  in  his  message,  prays 
for  the  unity  of  the  future  church,  and  interprets 
the  Lord's  Supper  even  before  he  has  established  it. 
His  cures  and  wonders,  which  in  the  earlier  Gospels 
seem  primarily  the  expression  of  his  overflowing 
spirit  of  sympathy  and  helpfulness,  now  become 
signs  or  proofs  to  support  his  high  claims. 

The  long  delay  of  the  return  of  Jesus  to  the 
world  had  caused  that  hope  which  had  been  so 
strong  at  first  to  decline  in  confidence  and  power. 
The  new  evangelist  at  once  acknowledges  and  ex- 
plains this  by  showing  that  the  return  of  Jesus  has 
already  taken  place  in  the  coming  of  his  spirit  into 
the  hearts  of  Christian  believers.  He  thus  trans- 
forms the  Jewish  apocalyptic  expectation  into  a 
spiritual  experience.1  He  foresees  that  under  the 
guidance  of  this  spirit  the  Christian  consciousness 
will  constantly  grow  into  greater  knowledge  and 
power. 

Toward  the  close  of  his  Gospel  the  writer  states 
his  purpose  in  writing  it  to  be  to  give  his  readers 


The  Gospel  According  to  John       117 

faith  in  Jesus  as  the  Christ,  and  thus  to  enable 
them  to  have  life  through  his  name.2  This  idea  of 
the  life  to  be  derived  from  Jesus  is  prominent  in  the 
whole  Gospel.  Christ  is  the  source  of  life  of  a  real 
and  lasting  kind,  and  it  can  only  be  obtained 
through  mystic  contact  with  him.  This  is  because 
Jesus  is  the  full  revelation  of  God  in  human  life. 
This  doctrine,  which  we  call  the  Incarnation,  is 
fundamental  in  the  Gospel  of  John:  "In  the  be- 
ginning was  the  Word  and  the  Word  was  with  God 
and  the  Word  was  God And  the  Word  be- 
came flesh  and  dwelt  among  us,  and  we  beheld  his 

glory I  am  come  that  they  may  have  life  and 

that  they  may  have  it  abundantly." 

While  the  Gospel  of  John  contains  no  parables, 
in  a  sense  it  is  a  parable.  It  presents  an  inter- 
pretation of  Jesus  in  the  form  of  a  narrative  of  his 
ministry.  The  writer  feels  that  the  Jewish  title  of 
Messiah  does  not  express  the  full  religious  signifi- 
cance of  Jesus,  but  by  finding  for  it  an  expression 
in  Greek  philosophical  terms  he  transplants  Chris- 
tian thought  and  the  Christian  movement  into 
Greek  soil.  It  was  easy  for  persons  of  Greek 
education  to  understand  the  claim  that  Jesus  was 
the  divine  Logos,  or  Word,  of  the  Stoic  philoso- 
phers, and  a  gospel  which  began  with  such  a  claim 
would  be  likely  to  arrest  their  attention.  The 
writer  still  thinks  of  Jesus  as  Messiah,  and  retains 
his  respect  for  the  Jewish  scriptures.    Indeed,  the 


n8    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

idea  of  the  revealing  Word  of  Jehovah  appears 
now  and  again  in  Jewish  literature,  and  the  Jewish 
philosopher  Philo  had  already  identified  it  with  the 
Logos  of  Greek  thought.  This  made  it  all  the 
easier  for  the  writer  of  the  new  Gospel  to  apply  it 
to  Jesus,  but  in  this  interpretation  of  Jesus  as  the 
divine  Word  he  goes  beyond  previous  Christian 
thinkers  and  takes  a  long  and  bold  step  in  the 
development  of  Christian  theology. 

The  Gospel  is  the  story  of  Jesus'  gradual  revela- 
tion of  himself  to  Ms  disciples  and  followers.  The 
opening  sentences  present  its  main  ideas  in  words 
intelligible  and  attractive  to  Greek  minds.  Over 
against  the  followers  of  John  the  Baptist,  who  still 
constituted  a  sect  in  the  writer's  day  as  they  had 
in  Paul's,3  the  evangelist  relates  John's  ready  testi- 
mony to  Jesus  as  the  Son  of  God  and  Lamb  of  God. 
With  a  few  followers,  some  of  them  directed  to  him  by 
John,  Jesus  visits  Cana  and  in  the  first  of  his  "  signs  " 
indicates  his  power  to  transform  human  nature.4 
After  a  brief  stay  in  Capernaum  he  goes  to  Jerusa- 
lem to  the  Passover,  and  there  clears  the  temple  of 
the  dealers  in  sacrificial  birds  and  animals  who 
with  their  traffic  victimized  the  people  and  dis- 
turbed places  meant  for  prayer.  The  Jews  demand 
a  sign  in  proof  of  his  right  to  do  this,  and  he  answers 
with  a  prophecy  of  his  resurrection.  In  a  conversa- 
tion with  Nicodemus,  Jesus  explains  that  a  new 
birth  of  water  and  the  Spirit,  that  is,  baptism  and 


The  Gospel  According  to  John       119 

spiritual  illumination,  must  precede  the  new  life  of 
the  Kingdom.  Jesus  comes  near  the  place  where 
John  is  baptizing  and  John  gives  fresh  testimony 
to  his  superiority.  To  avoid  overshadowing  John, 
Jesus  goes  into  Galilee,5  and  on  the  way  explains 
the  water  of  life  to  a  Samaritan  woman  and  re- 
veals himself  as  the  Messiah  and  the  source  of 
eternal  life.  In  Galilee  Jesus  is  favorably  received 
and  performs  the  second  of  the  seven  signs  that 
punctuate  his  earthly  ministry.  Soon  another  feast 
brings  him  to  Jerusalem.  There  he  heals  an 
impotent  man  on  the  Sabbath  and,  in  the  discus- 
sions which  ensue  with  the  Jews,  expounds  his 
relation  to  God.  Returning  to  Galilee,  he  feeds  a 
great  multitude  by  the  Sea  of  Galilee  and  declares 
himself  the  bread  of  life,  for  everyone  who  beholds 
him  and  believes  on  him  shall  have  eternal  life. 
At  the  Feast  of  Tabernacles  he  is  again  in  Jerusa- 
lem, teaching  in  the  temple,  although  danger  from 
the  Jewish  authorities  threatens  him.  He  declares 
that  he  is  sent  by  God  and  offers  his  hearers  the 
water  of  life,  which  the  evangelist  interprets  to 
mean  his  Spirit,  which  was  to  be  given  to  his  fol- 
lowers after  his  resurrection.  He  proclaims  himself 
the  light  of  the  world  and  when  the  Jews  object 
claims  the  witness  of  God  for  his  message.  He 
promises  truth  and  freedom  to  those  who  abide  in 
his  words,  and  declares  his  sinlessness  and  pre- 
existence.    He  restores  a  blind  man's  sight  on  the 


120    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Sabbath,  and  in  the  discussions  that  follow  declares 
himself  the  Son  of  God  and  the  Good  Shepherd. 
Soon  after  at  Bethany  Jesus  raises  Lazarus  from 
the  dead  and  proclaims  himself  the  Resurrection 
and  the  Life.  The  hostility  of  the  Jewish  rulers 
becomes  so  bitter  that  he  conceals  himself  for  a 
little  while  in  Ephraim,  but  as  the  Passover 
approaches  he  goes  up  to  Bethany.  Enthusiastic 
crowds  go  out  from  Jerusalem  to  meet  him  and 
escort  him  in  messianic  state  into  the  city.  Greeks 
asl$.  that  they  may  meet  him,  and  Jesus  answers 
that  he  is  now  to  be  glorified  but  that  it  must  be 
through  his  death.  In  his  last  hours  with  his  dis- 
ciples he  comforts  them  in  preparation  for  his 
departure,  and  promises  to  send  them  his  spirit  to 
comfort  and  instruct  them.  Under  the  figure  of 
the  vine  and  the  branches  he  teaches  them  the 
necessity  of  abiding  in  him,  the  source  of  life.  As 
he  has  come  from  the  Father  so  now  he  must 
return  to  him.  Finally,  in  an  intercessory  prayer, 
he  asks  God's  protection  for  his  disciples  and  the 
church  they  are  to  found. 

Leaving  the  city,  he  goes  with  his  disciples  to  a 
garden  on  the  Mount  of  Olives.  There  Judas 
brings  a  band  to  arrest  him,  but  they  are  at  first 
overawed  by  his  dignity,  and  only  after  securing 
the  freedom  of  his  disciples  does  Jesus  go  with 
them.'  He  is  examined  before  the  high  priests  and 
before  Pilate,  and  on  the  charge  that  he  claims  to 


The  Gospel  According  to  John        121 

be  the  king  of  the  Jews  he  is  sentenced  to  be  cruci- 
fied. The  evangelist  is  careful  to  show  that  Jesus 
retains  his  sense  of  divine  commission  to  the  last 
and  dies  with  the  words,  "It  is  finished,"  on  his 
lips,  and  he  bears  solemn  testimony  to  the  piercing 
of  his  side  and  the  undoubted  reality  of  his  death. 
These  details  were  important  for  the  correction  of 
the  Docetic  idea  that  the  divine  spirit  abandoned 
Jesus  on  the  cross.  The  writer  also  indicates  that 
Jesus  was  crucified  on  the  day  before  the  Passover, 
so  that  his  sacrificial  death  fell  on  the  day  on  which 
the  Passover  lamb  was  sacrificed.  On  this  point  he 
corrects  the  earlier  gospel  narratives. 

Early  on  the  first  day  of  the  following  week 
Jesus  appears  to  Mary.  The  same  evening  he 
appears  to  the  disciples,  imparts  his  spirit  to  them, 
and  commissions  them  to  forgive  sins.  Eight  days 
later  he  again  appears  to  them  when  Thomas  is 
with  them  and  convinces  Thomas  of  the  reality  of 
his  resurrection.  The  Gospel  closes  with  the  evan- 
gelist's statement  of  his  purpose  in  writing  it:  that 
his  readers  may  believe  that  Jesus  is  the  Christ, 
the  Son  of  God,  and  that,  believing,  they  may  have 
life  in  his  name. 

To  the  Gospel  of  John  an  appendix  or  epilogue 
was  afterward  added.7  It  reports  an  appearance 
of  the  risen  Jesus  by  the  Sea  of  Tiberias,  or  Galilee, 
and  his  conversation  on  that  occasion  with  Peter, 
in  which  he  predicts  Peter's  death,  but  seems  in 


122    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

intimate  that  the  beloved  disciple  may  live  until 
his  own  return.  The  Gospel  never  names  this 
disciple,  but  by  describing  him  several  times  in 
this  way  it  makes  him  more  conspicuous  than  any 
name'  could  make  him.  The  beloved  disciple  has 
perhaps  died,  for  tne  epilogue  explains  that  Jesus 
did  not  exactly  say  that  the  beloved  disciple  would 
survive  until  his  coming.  This  epilogue  may  have 
been  added  to  the  Gospel  to  correct  the  popular 
misunderstanding  about  Jesus'  words  to  Peter,  and 
to  claim  the  beloved  disciple's  authority  and  even 
authorship  for  the  Gospel.  There  are  indeed  some 
points  in  the  Gospel  which  seem  to  involve  better 
information  on  the  part  of  its  writer  than  the  earlier 
evangelists  had.  But  the  whole  character  of  the 
narrative  and  its  evident  preference  for  the  sym- 
bolic and  theological,  as  compared  with  the  merely 
historical,  are  against  the  assigning  of  its  composi- 
tion to  a  personal  follower  of  Jesus.  It  is  very 
probable  that  it  was  written  by  that  Elder  of 
Ephesus  who  perhaps  after  the  publication  of  this 
Gospel  wrote  the  three  letters  that  bear  the  name 
of  John. 

The  Gospel  of  John  was  wholly  successful  in 
what  it  undertook.  It  was  not  at  first  generally 
welcomed  by  the  churches,  but  in  the  course  of  half 
a  century  it  came  to  be  accepted  side  by  side  with 
the  earlier  Gospels,  and  in  its  influence  upon  Chris- 
tian thought  it  finally  altogether  surpassed  them. 


The  Gospel  According  to  John       123 

Its  great  ideas  of  revelation,  life,  love,  truth,  and 
freedom,  its  doctrine  of  the  spirit  as  ever  guiding 
the  Christian  consciousness  into  larger  vision  and 
achievement,  and  its  insistence  upon  Jesus  as  the 
supreme  revelation  of  God  and  the  source  of 
spiritual  life,  have  given  it  unique  and  perma- 
nent religious  worth. 

SUGGESTIONS  TOR  STUDY 

i.  References:  xJohn  14:3,  16-18,  23,  26,  28;  15:26; 
2 John  20:31;  3Acts  19:1-7;  4John  2:11;  sJohn  4:1,  2; 
6Johni8:8,o;  » John,  chap.  21. 

2.  Read  John  1:1-18,  noting  in  the  passage  the  leading 
ideas  of  the  whole  Gospel:  revelation,  incarnation,  and 
Christ  the  source  of  life  and  light. 

3.  Notice  in  2 :  13-16  that  the  cleansing  of  the  temple  is 
put  early  in  Jesus'  ministry.  Where  in  his  work  do  our  other 
Gospels  put  it  ? 

4.  Count  Jesus'  visits  to  Jerusalem  in  John  and  the 
number  of  Passover  feasts  mentioned  in  the  course  of  Jesus' 
ministry,  2:13;  5:1;  6:4;  7:2,10;  10:22,23;  12:1,12. 

5.  How  long  a  ministry  does  this  imply?  How  many 
passovers  and  visits  to  Jerusalem  does  Mark  record  ? 

6.  Note  the  seven  signs  wrought  by  Jesus  before  his 
crucifixion,  2:11;  4:54;  5:9;  6:11;  6:19;  9:7;  11:43,44. 
Cf.  20:30. 

7.  Why  does  the  evangelist  record  these  signs  and  how 
does  he  interpret  them  ?    Cf.  20:31. 

8.  Are  the  discourses  in  John  mainly  ethical,  like  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount;  eschatological,  like  Mark,  chap.  13; 
theological;  or  apologetic,  that  is,  in  defense  of  the  pre- 
existence,  messiahship,  or  authority  of  Jesus  ? 


124    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

9.  With  all  its  emphasis  upon  belief  (20:31),  note  the 
other,  mystical,  side  of  the  Gospel's  teaching,  15:1-19.  Do 
you  see  any  resemblance  here  to  First  John  ? 

10.  Notice  that  the  writer  speaks  frequently  of  "the 
Jews"  as  over  against  Jesus  and  his  followers,  though  these 
latter  were  Jews  too  in  the  period  of  Jesus'  ministry.  Con- 
sider whether  this  suggests  that  he  wrote  at  a  time  when 
the  Christians  and  the  Jews  were  sharply  distinguished. 

11.  Someone  has  said  that  there  are  a  hundred  quota- 
tions from  Matthew,  Mark,  and  Luke  in  the  Gospel  of  John. 
Can  you  find  any  such  ? 

12.  Mark  14:12-17  puts  the  Last  Supper  on  the  day  on 
which  the  Passover  lamb  was  sacrificed.  Are  John  13:1; 
18:28;  19:14,  meant  to  correct  this? 

13.  Is  the  writer's  conception  of  Christ  more  like  Paul's 
or  Mark's  ? 

14.  Is  his  idea  of  Jesus'  return  to  the  earth  like  Paul's  ? 

15.  What  is  the  religious  value  of  the  Gospel  of  John  ? 


CHAPTER  XVni 
THE  LETTERS  TO  TIMOTHY  AND  TO  TTTUS 

The  first  Christians  were  too  absorbed  in  the 
expectation  of  Jesus'  speedy  return  to  the  earth 
to  give  much  thought  to  practical  detail.  They 
cared  nothing  about  developing  a  literature,  a 
theology,  or  an  organization.  The  Lord  was 
at  hand.1  The  time  was  short.2  Why  should 
people  marry  or  slaves  seek  to  be  freed?  At 
any  moment  the  present  order  might  come  to 
an  end. 

But  time  wore  on  and  nothing  happened.  The 
first  leaders  passed  away,  but  the  churches  con- 
tinued their  work.  It  began  to  be  clear  that  the 
end  was  not  to  come  as  speedily  as  men  had  thought, 
and  that  the  churches  might  have  to  go  on  under 
the  existing  order  for  a  long  time.  Christian  lead- 
ers began  to  see  that  the  practical  side  of  church 
life  could  no  longer  be  neglected.  Spiritual  en- 
thusiasm and  well-meaning  devotion  were  no  longer 
enough.  Efficiency  must  be  insured.  Church  life 
must  be  regulated.  Church  officers  must  be  prop- 
erly qualified.  The  several  classes  of  people  in  the 
churches  must  be  shown  their  several  spheres  and 
functions  and  kept  to  them.  Efficiency  must  come 
through  organization. 


126    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Such  a  state  of  things,  it  is  true,  seems  a  serious 
decline  from  the  high,  confident,  spiritual  enthu- 
siasm of  the  apostolic  age.  But  after  the  prophet 
must  come  the  priest,  to  conserve  and  codify  the 
other's  work.  And  this  was  what  the  letters  to 
Timothy  and  to  Titus  sought  to  do. 

Many  churches  needed  to  be  shown  what  officers 
they  ought  to  have  to  carry  on  their  work  and  what 
kind  of  men  these  ought  to  be.  Marriage,  it  was 
now  evident,  ought  to  be  encouraged  and  sanctioned. 
The  charitable  work  of  the  churches  must  be  wisely 
directed  and  protected  from  abuse.  The  morals 
of  the  Christian  communities  needed  definite  cor- 
rection. Christian  leaders  needed  to  be  reminded 
that  they  must  set  a  worthy  example  of  conduct 
and  character.  The  homely  practical  lessons  which 
need  to  be  taught  so  often  had  to  be  put  before  the 
widest  possible  circle  of  churches  in  compact  and 
telling  form. 

In  these  letters  Christians  are  taught  to  pray 
for  kings  and  rulers  and  for  all  men.  Perhaps  the 
empire  has  not  yet  shown  its  hostile  attitude  to  the 
church.  Yet  First  Peter,  written  in  the  midst  of 
persecution,  bids  Christians  honor  the  emperor.3 
Certainly  the  Book  of  Revelation  takes  a  very  dif- 
ferent attitude  toward  kings.  Prayer  is  to  be 
offered  by  men.  Women  are  not  to  teach,  but  to 
occupy  a  subordinate  place  in  the  church  life.  Each 
church  may  have  as  officers  a  presiding  officer,  the 


The  Letters  to  Timothy  and  to  Titus     127 

bishop  or  elder,  and  his  assistants,  the  deacons. 
These  should  be  men  of  good  repute  and  blame- 
less character,  who  have  married  but  once.  A 
recent  convert  should  not  be  made  a  bishop,  and 
only  men  who  have  proved  their  faithfulness  in 
the  church  life  should  be  appointed  deacons. 

That  practical  helpfulness  which  had  character- 
ized the  churches  from  the  first  finds  natural 
expression  in  providing  for  the  support  of  destitute 
widows  in  the  Christian  community.  This  matter 
needs  to  be  safeguarded  against  abuse.  It  is  right 
that  children  or  grandchildren  who  are  able  to  do 
so  should  provide  for  their  widowed  mothers  or 
grandmothers.  Only  widows  past  middle  life  and 
without  any  kindred  able  to  provide  for  them  are 
to  become  the  permanent  pensioners  of  the  church. 

Novel  religious  speculations  remote  from  prac- 
tical life  are  to  be  discouraged  and  avoided.  Some 
teachers  have  declared  that  the  resurrection  has 
already  taken  place;  an  idea  perhaps  due  to  a 
misunderstanding  of  Paul's  teaching  that  conver- 
sion and  baptism  usher  the  believer,  risen  with 
Christ,  into  a  new  and  blessed  life.  Such  innova- 
tions are  to  be  sternly  condemned. 

It  was  the  coming  in  of  these  new  currents  of 
teaching  that  most  perplexed  Christian  leaders 
toward  the  end  of  the  first  century.  How  were  they 
to  be  met  and  controlled  ?  They  sometimes  seemed 
to  threaten  the  life  of  the  churches.    To  whom, 


128    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

when  the  first  great  leaders  of  Paul's  generation 
were  gone,  could  their  less  gifted  successors  appeal 
in  matters  of  conscience  and  faith  ?  This  is  one  of 
the  questions  these  epistles  to  Christian  ministers 
undertake  to  answer.  It  is  not  easy  to  realize  how 
far  early  Christian  thought,  on  a  great  many  mat- 
ters, was  from  being  definite  and  specific.  The 
words  of  Jesus  all  recognized  as  authoritative,  and 
also  the  voice  of  his  Spirit  in  their  own  hearts. 
But  one  Christian  might  put  forth  views  widely 
different  from  another's  and  claim  for  them  the 
authority  of  the  Spirit.  Which  was  right  ?  Who 
was  to  decide? 

In  the  midst  of  this  rising  confusion  of  belief 
and  teaching  the  churches  fell  back  upon  the  let- 
ters of  Paul.  New  teachings  that  conflicted  with 
his  must  be  false.  In  addition  to  Paul's  letters 
and  the  memory  of  his  teaching  there  was  also 
what  we  call  the  Old  Testament.  Jesus  had  dis- 
owned various  parts  of  it,  and  Paul  had  denied  the 
religious  efficacy  of  the  Law,  but  Christian  leaders 
felt  safer  in  following  them  in  their  indorsement 
of  the  Jewish  scriptures  than  in  their  partial  re- 
jection of  them,  and  very  definitely  added  the  Old 
Testament  to  their  new  authorities.  We  have 
evidence  of  this  tendency  in  the  Gospels  of  Mat- 
thew and  John,  but  it  is  Second  Timothy  that 
first  puts  it  decisively  and  unequivocally.  Every 
scripture  inspired  of  God,  it  was  now  felt,  was 


The  Letters  to  Timothy  and  to  Titus     129 

profitable  for  teaching,  reproof,  and  instruction. 
The  church  had  adopted  the  Old  Testament.4 

With  the  words  of  Jesus,  a  few  letters  of  Paul, 
and  the  Jewish  scriptures  at  their  backs,  the  Chris- 
tians could  now  feel  in  a  measure  prepared  to  test 
new  religious  teachings  which  original  spirits  in 
their  own  community  or  Christian  visitors  from 
distant  churches  might  set  forth  in  the  local  meet- 
ings. The  new  teaching  had  to  square  with  the 
old  apostolic  teaching.  If  it  conflicted  with  that, 
it  could  not  stand.  It  must  be  possible  also  to 
harmonize  it  with  the  Old  Testament.  That  Paul 
and  Jesus  did  not  always  conform  to  the  Old  Testa- 
ment did  not  at  once  appear  nor  greatly  matter. 
What  was  needed  was  authorities,  and  with  Jesus, 
Paul,  and  the  literature  of  the  Old  Testament  the 
need  was  satisfied. 

That  the  letters  to  Timothy  and  Titus  claim 
Paul  as  their  author  may  be  due  to  the  fact  that 
short  genuine  letters  of  his  were  made  the  basis  of 
them  by  some  later  follower  of  Paul  who  composed 
them.  At  any  rate,  the  writer  felt  justified  in  claim- 
ing Paul's  authority  for  what  he  thought  a  neces- 
sary and  timely  supplement  to  the  letters  Paul  had 
left  behind,  and  doubtless  thought  he  was  doing 
just  what  Paul  would  have  done  had  he  lived  to 
see  the  conditions  the  writer  saw.  But  the  value 
of  these  letters  lay  in  the  practical  direction  they 
gave  the  churches  of  their  time,  showing  them  how 


130    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

to  readjust  their  high  hopes  of  Jesus'  return  and 
to  set  themselves  to  the  task  of  establishing  and 
perpetuating  their  work.  In  these  little  letters  we 
see  the  church  after  the  lofty  enthusiasm  of  its 
first  great  experience  settling  down  to  the  common 
life  of  the  common  day  and  grappling  with  its  age- 
long task. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOR  STUDY 

i.  References:  xPhil.  4:5;  aI  Cor.  7:29;  3I  Pet.  2:17; 
m  Tim.  3:16. 

2.  Notice  that  First  Timothy  is  a  letter  of  instruction 
to  a  Christian  pastor  or  minister,  4:6,  and  that  his  public 
functions  are  reading,  exhortation,  and  teaching,  4:13. 
What  would  he  read  in  church  ?    Cf.  II  Tim.  3:15,  16. 

3.  Read  I  Tim.  3:1-13,  noticing  the  church  officers 
mentioned  and  the  qualifications  they  ought  to  have.  What 
is  the  chief  emphasis  in  these  ? 

4.  Note  the  writer's  somewhat  indiscriminate  condem- 
nation of  the  advocates  of  a  different  type  of  Christian 
teaching,  I  Tim.  4:1-3;  II  Tim.  3:1-9;  Titus  1:10-16. 
Does  he  give  a  clear  picture  of  their  teachings  ? 

5.  Notice  the  writer's  indorsement  of  marriage,  I  Tim. 
3:2,  12;  4:1-3;  Titus  1:6. 

6.  Observe  the  writer's  rule  as  to  women  teachers,  I 
Tim.  2:11,  12.    Cf.  Acts  18:26. 

7.  What  is  meant  in  these  letters  by  "faith"  ?  Is  it  an 
inward  attitude  of  trust  and  dependence  upon  God  or  a 
deposit  of  truth  to  be  guarded  and  preserved  ? 

8.  In  what  does  the  Christian  life  consist,  according  to 
these  letters  ? 

9.  Do  any  of  Paul's  great  characteristic  ideas  appear  in 
these  letters? 


The  Letters  to  Timothy  and  to  Titus    131 

10.  Is  II  Tim.  4:6-8,  which  we  may  call  Paul's  epitaph, 
any  less  appropriate  or  significant,  considered  as  an  early 
Christian's  estimate  of  Paul,  than  when  viewed  as  Paul's 
own  commendation  of  himself? 

11.  What  would  be  the  immediate  practical  value  of 
these  letters  to  the  scattered  pastors  and  ministers  of  the 
early  churches? 


CHAPTER  XIX 

THE  EPISTLE  OF  JUDE  AND  THE  SECOND 
EPISTLE  OF  PETER 

Many  ancient  thinkers  conceived  of  the  supreme 
God  as  far  removed  from  the  material  world  and 
too  pure  to  have  anything  directly  to  do  with  it. 
The  necessary  connection  between  God  and  the 
world,  they  thought,  was  made  through  a  series  of 
intermediate  ideas,  influences,  or  beings,  to  one  of 
which  they  ascribed  the  creation  and  supervision 
of  the  material  world.  When  people  with  these 
views  became  Christians,  they  brought  most  of 
their  philosophical  ideas  with  them  into  the  church 
and  combined  them  as  far  as  they  could  with  their 
new  Christian  faith. 

In  this  way  there  came  to  be  many  Christians 
who  held  that  the  God  of  this  world  could  not  be 
the  supreme  God  whom  Jesus  called  his  Father. 
Their  view  of  Jesus  himself  seemed  to  most  Chris- 
tians a  denial  of  him,  for  they  held  to  the  Docetic 
idea  that  the  divine  Spirit  left  him  before  his  death. 
They  accordingly  saw  little  religious  meaning  in 
his  death,  but  they  considered  themselves  so  spirit- 
ual that  they  did  not  feel  the  need  of  an  atonement. 
In  fact,  they  felt  so  secure  in  their  spirituality  that 
they  thought  it  did  not  much  matter  what  they 

13a 


Jude  and  Second  Peter  133 

did  in  the  flesh,  and  so  they  permitted  themselves 
without  scruple  all  sorts  of  indulgence. 

Such  people  could  not  help  being  a  scandal  in 
the  churches,  and  a  Christian  teacher  named  Jude 
made  them  the  object  of  a  letter  of  unsparing  con- 
demnation. He  had  been  on  the  point  of  writing 
for  some  Christian  friends  of  his  a  discourse  on 
their  common  salvation  when  word  reached  him 
that  such  persons  had  appeared  among  them.  He 
immediately  sent  his  friends  a  short  vehement  let- 
ter condemning  the  immoral  practices  of  these 
people,  predicting  their  destruction,  and  warning 
his  readers  against  their  influence.  He  quotes 
against  them  with  the  greatest  confidence  passages 
from  the  Book  of  Enoch1  and  the  Assumption  of 
Moses,2  late  Jewish  writings  which  he  seems  to 
regard  as  scripture.  The  persons  he  attacks  still 
belong  to  Christian  churches  and  attend  Christian 
meetings.  He  does  not  tell  his  readers  to  exclude 
them  from  their  fellowship  but  to  have  pity  on 
them  and  to  try  to  save  them,  only  taking  care 
not  to  become  infected  with  their  faults. 

Who  this  Jude  was  we  cannot  tell.  He  looks 
back  upon  the  age  of  the  apostles,  asking  his 
readers  to  recollect  how  they  have  foretold  that 
as  time  draws  on  toward  the  end  scoffers  will 
appear.  He  probably  wrote  early  in  the  second 
century.  The  words  "the  brother  of  James"  were 
probably  added  to  his  name  by  some  later  copier 


134    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

of  his  letter  who  took  the  writer  to  be  the  Judas 
or  Jude  mentioned  in  Mark  6:3  and  Matt.  13:55 
as  a  brother  of  James  and  Jesus. 

A  generation  after  this  vigorous  letter  was 
written  it  was  taken  over  almost  word  for  word 
into  what  we  know  as  Second  Peter.  In  the  early 
part  of  the  second  century  various  books  were 
written  in  Christian  circles  about  the  apostle  Peter, 
or  even  in  his  name,  until  one  could  have  collected 
a  whole  New  Testament  bearing  his  name.  There 
were  a  Gospel  of  Peter,  Acts  of  Peter,  the  Teaching 
of  Peter,  the  Preaching  of  Peter,  the  Epistles  of 
Peter,  and  the  Revelation  of  Peter.  Most  of  these 
laid  claim  to  being  from  the  pen  of  Peter  himself. 

The  one  that  most  insistently  claims  Peter  as  its 
author  is  our  Second  Peter.  It  comes  out  of  a  time 
when  Christians  were  seriously  doubting  the  second 
coming  of  Jesus.  A  hundred  years  perhaps  had 
passed  since  Jesus'  ministry,  and  men  were  saying, 
"Where  is  his  promised  coming?  For  from  the 
day  the  fathers  fell  asleep  all  things  continue  as 
they  were  from  the  beginning  of  creation."  The 
spiritualizing  of  the  second  coming  which  the  Gos- 
pel of  John  wrought  out  did  not  commend  itself  to 
the  writer  of  Second  Peter,  if  he  was  acquainted 
with  it.  He  prefers  to  meet  the  skepticism  of  his 
day  about  the  second  coming  with  a  sturdy  insist- 
ence on  the  old  doctrine.  In  support  of  it  he  appeals 
to  the  Transfiguration,  which  he  seems  to  know 


Jude  and  Second  Peter  135 

from  the  Gospel  of  Matthew,3  and  to  the  wide- 
spread ancient  belief  that  the  universe  is  to  be 
destroyed  by  fire.4  He  repeats  the  denunciation 
which  Jude  hurled  at  the  gnostic  libertines  of  his 
day,  only  it  is  now  directed  against  those  who  are 
giving  up  the  expectation  of  the  second  coming. 
Jude  has  some  hope  of  correcting  and  saving  the 
persons  he  condemned,  but  the  writer  of  Second 
Peter  has  no  hope  about  those  whom  he  attacks. 
He  supports  his  exhortations  by  an  appeal  to  the 
letters  of  Paul.5  He  evidently  knows  a  number  of 
them,  for  he  speaks  of  "all  his  letters."  He  con- 
siders them  scripture,  and  says  that  many  misin- 
terpret them,  to  their  own  spiritual  ruin.  This 
view  of  the  letters  of  Paul,  combined  with  the  use 
in  Second  Peter  of  other  New  Testament  books, 
proves  it  to  be  the  latest  book  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment. It  was  not  addressed  to  any  one  church  or 
district,  but  was  published  as  a  tract  or  pamphlet, 
to  correct  the  growing  disbelief  in  the  second 
coming  of  Jesus;  and  to  enforce  his  message  its 
writer  put  it  forth,  as  other  men  of  his  time  were 
putting  forth  theirs,  under  the  great  name  of  Peter. 

SUGGESTIONS  FOE  STUDY 

i.  References:  '  Jude,  vss.  14,  15;  *  Jude,  vs.  g;  *  EI  Pet. 
1:16-18;  <II  Pet  3:10;  « II  Pet.  3:15,  16. 

2.  Note  the  picture  drawn  in  Jude  of  the  errorists  under 
discussion,  vss.  4,  8,  10,  12,  16,  18,  19,  and  the  writer's 
unsparing  denunciation  of  them. 


136    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

3.  Compare  Jude,  vss.  4-18,  with  II  Pet.  2:1 — 3:3, 
noting  the  close  resemblance. 

4.  Notice  the  quotations  from  late  Jewish  writings: 
from  the  Assumption  of  Moses  in  Jude,  vs.  9,  and  from  the 
Book  of  Enoch  in  Jude,  vss.  14,  15.  Does  the  writer  regard 
these  books  as  scripture  ? 

5.  Notice  the  vagueness  of  the  address  of  Jude.  To 
whom  is  it  addressed  or  dedicated? 

6.  Doe  Second  Peter  seem  from  its  salutation,  1:1, 
to  have  been  sent  as  a  letter  or  published  as  a  tract  or 
pamphlet  ? 

7.  Notice  in  Second  Peter  the  references  to  Jesus'  pre- 
diction of  Peter's  death,  1:14  (cf.  John  21:18,  19);  to  the 
Transfiguration,  1:17,  18,  most  resembling  Matt.  17:5;  to 
I  Pet.  (3:1),  and  to  the  letters  of  Paul,  3: 15,  16. 

8.  What  do  these  last  verses  imply  as  to  the  collection 
of  Paul's  letters,  the  esteem  in  which  they  were  held,  and 
the  sectarian  use  being  made  of  them  in  some  quarters  at 
the  time  when  Second  Peter  was  written  ? 

9.  Observe  in  II  Pet.  3:3,  4  the  writer's  condemnation 
of  those  who  have  given  up  the  expectation  of  the  return  of 
Jesus. 

10.  Notice  the  support  the  writer  finds  for  his  views  in 
the  Stoic  doctrine  that  the  material  universe  would  ulti- 
mately be  destroyed  by  fire,  3:10. 

11.  Compare  the  first  clause  of  3:10  with  one  in  the 
earliest  book  in  the  New  Testament,  I  Thess.  5:2.  Is  this  a 
quotation — the  writer  of  Second  Peter  knows  some  letters 
of  Paul  (cf.  3 :  15) — or  a  coincidence  ? 


CHAPTER  XX 
THE  MAKING  OF  THE  NEW  TESTAMENT 

When  the  latest  book  of  the  New  Testament 
had  been  written,  there  was  still  no  New  Testa- 
ment. Its  books  had  to  be  collected  and  credited 
with  a  peculiar  authority  before  the  New  Testa- 
ment could  be  said  to  exist.  What  led  to  this 
collection  and  estimate  ? 

For  the  first  Christians  the  chief  authority  was 
Jesus.  What  he  had  taught  they  accepted  as  true 
and  binding.  Believing  that  his  spirit  still  spoke 
in  their  own  hearts,  they  ascribed  the  same  author- 
ity to  its  inward  directions.1  Men  who  possessed 
this  spirit  in  an  especial  measure,  the  Christian 
prophets,  sometimes  wrote  down  their  revelations, 
and  these  came  naturally  to  have  the  authority  of 
scripture,  that  is,  the  authority  which  the  Christian 
believers  attached  to  the  writings  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment. Jesus'  teaching  was  at  first  handed  down 
in  the  form  of  tradition;  new  converts  learned  it 
from  those  who  were  already  Christians,  and  in 
turn  taught  it  by  word  of  mouth  to  those  who 
became  believers  later.2  But  when  gospels  were 
written  these  began  to  take  the  place  of  this  oral 
handing  down,  or  tradition,  of  Jesus'  words,  and 
soon  the  gospel  writing,  and  not  simply  the  sayings 

137 


138    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

of  Jesus  that  it  contained,  came  to  be  regarded 
as  the  authority.  Authority  thus  gradually  and 
naturally  passed  from  the  words  of  Jesus,  and  the 
thoughts  of  believers  endowed  with  his  spirit,  to 
books  embodying  these. 

Almost  from  the  beginning,  too,  Christians  had 
held  Jesus'  apostles  in  high  esteem.  Jesus  had 
committed  the  continuation  of  his  work  to  them. 
Paul,  though  not  one  of  the  Twelve,  had  by  his 
zeal,  devotion,  and  missionary  success,  convinced 
the  churches  that  he  too  was  in  a  real  sense  an 
apostle.  His  martyrdom  gave  added  weight  to  the 
teachings  he  had  left  behind  in  his  letters,  and 
these  came  to  be  considered  as  Christian  authori- 
ties of  equal  rank  with  gospels  and  revelations. 
Through  the  informal  interchange  of  copies  these 
books  spread  from  church  to  church  and  came 
gradually  to  be  read  in  the  various  churches  in 
their  meetings,  along  with  the  books  of  the  Old 
Testament. 

In  the  early  years  of  the  second  century  gifted 
but  erratic  Christian  teachers  began  to  divide  the 
scattered  and  unorganized  churches  into  parties 
or  sects.  Other  Christian  teachers,  fearful  of  these 
schismatic  tendencies,  opposed  these  novel  views 
and  insisted  upon  what  they  considered  the  true 
and  original  Christian  belief.  In  these  contro- 
versies with  heretics,  that  is,  sectarians  or  schis- 
matics,  Christians   in    general    more   and    more 


The  Making  of  the  New  Testament    139 

appealed  in  support  of  their  views  to  the  books  and 
letters  which  had  come  down  to  them  from  earlier 
times  and  which  they  believed  presented  Chris- 
tianity in  its  true  and  abiding  form.  In  this  way 
greater  emphasis  came  to  be  laid  upon  the  letters 
of  Paul,  the  Gospels,  and  the  Revelation. 

The  first  step  toward  collecting  early  Christian 
writings  of  which  we  have  any  definite  knowledge 
was  taken  strangely  enough  by  one  of  these  sec- 
tarian leaders,  a  certain  Marcion,  of  Pontus  in 
Asia  Minor.  He  was  a  well-to-do  ship-owner  of 
Sinope.  He  had  become  convinced  that  the  God 
of  the  Old  Testament  could  not  be  identified  with 
the  loving  heavenly  Father  whom  Jesus  proclaimed, 
and  so  he  rejected  the  Old  Testament.  Something 
had  of  course  to  be  put  in  its  place  for  purposes  of 
Christian  worship  and  devotion,  and  Marcion  pro- 
posed a  Christian  collection,  consisting  of  the  Gos- 
pel of  Luke  and  ten  letters  of  Paul.  He  did  not 
include  in  this  list  the  letters  to  Timothy  and  Titus. 
He  accompanied  his  list  with  a  work  of  his  own 
called  the  Antitheses,  in  which  he  sought  to  show 
that  the  God  of  the  Jewish  scriptures  could  not  be 
the  God  revealed  in  Jesus.  The  wide  influence  of 
Marcion  must  have  done  much  to  promote  the 
circulation  of  the  letters  of  Paul,  whose  interpreta- 
tion of  Christianity  he  regarded  with  especial  favor. 

About  the  same  time  Christian  teachers  in  Asia 
put  forth  the  Four  Gospels  together,  perhaps  in 


140    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

order  to  increase  the  influence  of  the  Gospel  of 
John,  which  Christians  attached  to  the  lifelong  use 
of  Matthew  or  Luke  might  find  easier  of  acceptance 
if  it  were  circulated  along  with  the  Gospel  to  which 
they  were  accustomed.  But  it  is  not  until  about 
185  A.  d.  that  we  find  anything  like  our  New  Testa- 
ment in  use  among  Christians.  By  that  time  a 
great  effort  had  been  made  by  leading  Christians  of 
the  non-sectarian  type — who  regarded  their  form 
of  teaching  as  apostolic — to  unite  the  individual 
churches  of  East  and  West  into  one  great  body,  to 
resist  the  encroachments  of  the  sects.  The  basis 
of  this  union  was  the  acceptance  of  a  brief  form  of 
the  Apostles'  Creed,  episcopal  organization,  and  a 
body  of  Christian  scriptures,  substantially  equiva- 
lent to  our  New  Testament.  In  this  way  the 
Catholic,  that  is,  the  general  or  universal,  church 
began. 

The  New  Testament,  as  it  soon  came  to  be  called, 
did  not  displace  the  Jewish  scriptures  in  the  esteem 
of  the  church,  as  Marcion  had  meant  his  collection 
to  do.  It  stood  beside  the  Old  Testament,  but  a 
little  above  it,  for  the  Old  Testament  had  now  to 
be  interpreted  in  the  light  of  the  New.  The  books 
included  in  the  New  Testament  were  appealed  to 
in  debate  with  schismatics  as  trustworthy  rec- 
ords of  apostolic  belief  and  practice.  They  served 
an  even  more  important  purpose  in  being  read  from 
week   to   week,   in   the   public   meetings   of   the 


The  Making  of  the  New  Testament    141 

churches,  along  with  the  Old  Testament  scriptures. 
The  Jewish  idea  that  every  part  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment must  have  an  edifying  meaning  was  definitely 
accepted  by  early  Christians,  and  was  now  applied 
by  them  to  the  New  Testament  as  well.  This 
obliged  them,  as  it  had  the  Jews,  to  interpret  their 
sacred  books  allegorically,  and  so  the  historical 
meaning  of  the  New  Testament  books  was  neg- 
lected and  obscured,  and  finally  actually  forgotten. 
As  to  what  should  be  included  in  this  library  of 
preferred  and  authoritative  Christian  writings, 
there  was  agreement  among  the  churches  in  regard 
to  general  outlines,  but  no  little  diversity  of  views 
as  to  details.  All  accepted  the  Four  Gospels  so 
familiar  to  us,  and  thirteen  letters  of  Paul,  includ- 
ing those  to  Timothy  and  Titus.  The  Acts  of  the 
Apostles  and  three  or  four  epistles,  one  of  Peter, 
one  or  two  of  John,  and  that  of  Jude,  were  also 
generally  accepted.  Eastern  churches,  especially 
that  at  Alexandria,  holding  Hebrews  to  be  the 
work  of  Paul,  put  it  into  their  New  Testament,  but 
it  was  nearly  two  hundred  years  before  Rome  and 
the  western  churches  admitted  this.  The  West, 
on  the  other  hand,  accepted  the  Revelation  of 
John  as  early  as  the  middle  of  the  second  century, 
but  the  East  never  fully  recognized  its  right  to  a 
place  in  the  New  Testament  The  lesser  epistles 
of  John,  Peter,  and  James  were  variously  treated, 
some  accepting  them  and  others  refusing  to  do  so. 


142    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

The  Syrian  church  never  accepted  them  all,  but  in 
Alexandria  and  in  the  West  they  became  at  length 
established  as  parts  of  the  New  Testament,  mainly 
on  the  strength  of  their  supposed  apostolic  author- 
ship. 

Other  books  now  almost  forgotten  found  places 
in  the  New  Testament  in  the  third  and  fourth 
centuries.  One  of  the  oldest  Greek  manuscripts 
of  the  New  Testament  includes  the  so-called  let- 
ters of  Clement  of  Rome,  one  a  letter  from  the 
Roman  church  to  that  at  Corinth,  written  about 
the  end  of  the  first  century,  the  other  a  sermon 
sent  seventy  years  later  from  Rome  to  Corinth. 
Another  of  these  manuscripts  contains  the  Shep- 
herd, a  revelation  written  by  a  Roman  prophet 
named  Hennas,  toward  the  middle  of  the  second 
century,  to  bring  the  Roman  church  and  other 
Christians  to  genuine  and  lasting  repentance.  The 
so-called  Epistle  of  Barnabas,  a  curious  work  of 
a  slightly  earlier  time,  is  also  included  in  this  old 
manuscript.  These  oldest  extant  copies  of  the 
New  Testament  were  made  in  the  fourth  and  fifth 
centuries,  probably  for  church  use,  and  show  what 
books  were  considered  scripture  in  those  times  in 
the  places  where  these  manuscripts  were  written. 

The  list  of  New  Testament  books  that  we  know, 
that  is,  just  the  twenty-seven  we  find  in  our  New 
Testament  today,  and  no  others,  first  appears  in  a 
letter  written  by  Athanasius  of  Alexandria  at  Eas- 


The  Making  of  the  New  Testament    143 

ter  in  367  a.d.  But  long  after  that  time  there 
continued  to  be  some  disagreement  in  different 
places  and  among  different  Christian  teachers  as 
to  just  what  books  were  entitled  to  be  considered 
the  inspired  and  authoritative  Christian  writings. 
This  was  somewhat  less  felt  than  it  would  be  now, 
because  the  books  of  the  New  Testament  were  not 
often  all  included  in  a  single  manuscript.  People 
would  have  one  manuscript  containing  the  Gospels, 
another  containing  Paul's  letters,  a  third  contain- 
ing the  Acts  and  the  general  epistles — James,  Peter, 
John,  Jude — and  perhaps  a  fourth,  containing  the 
Revelation.  It  was  only  when  printing  was  in- 
vented that  the  whole  New  Testament  began  to 
be  generally  circulated  in  one  volume,  in  Latin, 
Greek,  German,  or  English. 

The  value  of  the  New  Testament  to  the  Chris- 
tian church  has  of  course  been  immeasurably  great. 
To  begin  with,  the  formation  of  the  collection  in- 
sured the  preservation  and  the  lasting  influence 
upon  Christian  character  of  the  best  of  the  earliest 
works  of  Christian  instruction  and  devotion.  While 
the  purpose  of  the  makers  of  the  New  Testament 
was  not  historical,  they  nevertheless  did  a  great 
service  for  Christian  history.  But  the  idea  of  es- 
tablishing a  list  of  Christian  writings  which  should 
be  exclusively  authoritative,  put  fetters  upon  the 
free  Christian  spirit  which  could  not  always  re- 
main.   Indeed,  the  New  Testament  itself  included 


144    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

in  Galatians  the  strongest  possible  assertion  of 
that  freedom,  and  so  carried  within  itself  the  cor- 
rective of  the  construction  which  Catholic  Chris- 
tianity put  upon  it.  But  though  Christians  in 
increasing  numbers  may  no  longer  attach  to  it 
the  dogmatic  values  of  the  past,  they  will  never 
cease  to  prize  it  for  its  inspiring  and  purifying 
power,  and  for  its  simple  and  moving  story  of  the 
ministry  of  Jesus.  Historically  understood,  the 
New  Testament  will  still  kindle  in  us  the  spirit 
which  animated  the  men  who  wrote  it,  who  aspired 
to  be  not  the  lords  of  our  faith  but  the  helpers  of 
our  joy. 

SUGGESTIONS   FOR   STUDY 

i.  References:    XI  Cor.  7:40;    14:37;  *I  Cor.  11:2,  23; 

15:3- 

2.  How  did  Paul,  Mark,  and  Luke  regard  the  sayings 
of  Jesus?    Cf.  I  Cor.  11:24,  25;  Acts  20:35. 

3.  Did  Paul  believe  that  he  had  the  authority  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  for  some  of  his  teachings?    Cf.  I  Cor.  7:40; 

i4:37- 

4.  Did  he  think  himself  alone  in  this?     Cf.  2:16;  7:40. 

5.  What  did  Paul  think  of  an  external  written  standard 
for  the  inner  life  ?    Cf .  II  Cor.  3 : 6. 

6.  Did  the  earliest  Christians  find  their  religious  author- 
ity without,  in  books  or  laws,  or  within,  in  their  spiritual 
intuitions  ? 

7.  Did  the  writer  of  the  Gospel  of  Matthew  think  Mark 
too  perfect  to  be  freely  revised  ? 

8.  Did  Luke  regard  his  sources,  including  Mark,  as  in- 
spired or  infallible  ?    Cf .  Luke  1 : 1-4, 


The  Making  of  the  New  Testament    145 

9.  How  does  the  writer  of  Second  Peter  regard  Paul's 
letters?    Cf.  3:15,  16. 

10.  Note  the  classing  of  prophets  and  apostles  together 
in  Eph.  2 :  20;  3:5,  and  in  Rev.  18 :  20. 

11.  Read  Rev.  21 :  14,  noting  the  high  esteem  in  which  a 
Christian  prophet  holds  the  apostles. 

12.  Note  the  full  acknowledgment  of  the  Jewish  scrip- 
tures as  inspired  in  II  Tim.  3 :  16,  17. 

13.  What  book  of  the  New  Testament  claims  to  be 
inspired  ? 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

GENERAL 

Moffatt,  James.    An  Introduction  to  the  Literature  of  the 
New  Testament.    New  York:  Scribner,  191 1. 

The  most  complete  and  valuable  introduction  to  the 
whole  literature. 

Streeter,  B.  H.    The  Four  Gospels:  A  Study  in  Origins. 
New  York:  Macmillan,  1925. 

Burton,  E.  D.    Short  Introduction  to  Die  Gospels.    Chicago: 

The  University  of  Chicago  Press,  1904. 

A  presentation  of  the  main  facts  about  the  purpose  and 
attitude  of  each  Gospel  necessary  for  reading  it  intelligently. 

Wrede,  W.     The  Origin  of  the  New  Testament.    New  York: 

Harper,  1909. 

Four  popular  lectures  on  the  origin  of  the  books  of  the 
New  Testament  and  of  the  New  Testament  itself,  by  a 
very  able  German  scholar. 

Soden,  H.  von.     The  History  of  Early  Christian  Literature: 
The    Writings    of   the    New    Testament.    New    York: 
Putnam,  1906. 
A  fuller  treatment  along  the  same  lines. 

Peake,  A.  S.    A  Critical  Introduction  to  tht  New  Testament. 

New  York:  Scribner,  1911. 

Good,  compact  introductions  to  the  several  books,  with 
especial  reference  to  recent  opinion  and  discussion,  which 
•are  clearly  summarized  and  criticized. 

Bacon,  B.  W.    Introduction  to  the  New  Testament.    New 
York:  Macmillan,  1900. 

146 


Bibliography  147 

Bacon,  B.  W.     The  Making  of  the  New  Testament.    New 

York:  Henry  Holt,  1912. 

These  books  cover  the  literature  of  the  New  Testament, 
the  first  book  by  book,  the  second  in  a  more  popular  and 
continuous  historical  way. 

McGiffert,  A.  C.     The  Apostolic  Age.    New  York:  Scrib- 

ner,  1910. 

Chaps,  iv-vi  deal  fully  and  helpfully  with  the  books 
of  the  New  Testament  in  their  relation  to  the  history  of 
early  Christianity  and  the  development  of  Christian  thought. 

Encyclopaedia  Britannica,  nth  ed.,  191 2. 
Valuable  articles  on  the  several  books. 

Hastings,  Dictionary  of  the  Bible.    New  York:    Scribner, 
1909.     1  vol. 
Good  short  articles  on  the  several  books. 


SPECIAL 

Bacon,  B.  W.    Galatians.    (The  Bible  for  Home  and  School.) 

New  York:  Macmillan,  1909. 

A  short  popular  commentary  with  a  good  introduction 
and  an  analysis  of  the  letter. 

Massie,  John.     Corinthians.     (New)  Century  Bible.    New 
York:  Frowde,  1902. 
A  good  short  commentary  for  popular  use. 

Gilbert,  G.  H.    Acts.     (The  Bible  for  Home  and  School.) 
New  York:  Macmillan,  1908. 
An  excellent  short  commentary  for  the  general  reader. 

Harnack,  A.     The  Acts  of  the  Apostles.    New  York:  Put- 
nam, 1909. 

The  introduction  to  this  volume  will  serve  admirably  to 
put  the  reader  into  the  atmosphere  of  the  Acts. 


148    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 

Porter,  F.  C.  Messages  of  the  Apocalyptic  Writers.  New 
York:  Scribner,  1905. 

A  popular  treatment  of  the  Revelation  showing  its  his- 
torical situation  and  its  relations  with  kindred  Jewish  lit- 
erature. 

Goodspeed,  E.  J.  Hebrews.  (The  Bible  for  Home  and 
School.)     New  York:  Macmillan,  1908. 

A  concise  commentary  for  popular  use,  with  a  some- 
what full  introduction  on  the  occasion,  purpose,  and  date 
of  the  letter. 

Scott,  E.  F.     The  Historical  and  Religious  Value  of  the 

Fourth  Gospel.    (Modern  Religious  Problems.)    Boston: 

Houghton  Mifflin  Co.,  1909. 

An  admirable  sketch,  for  the  general  reader,  of  the  pur- 
pose, ideas,  and  worth  of  the  Gospel  of  John. 

Lake,  Kirsopp.  The  Earlier  Epistles  of  St.  Paul.  Second 
Edition.    London:  Rivingtons,  1914. 

Burton,  E.  D.,  and  Goodspeed,  E.  J.  A  Harmony  of  the 
Synoptic  Gospels  for  Historical  and  Critical  Study. 
New  York:  Scribner,  191 7. 

Case,  Shirley  J.  The  Revelation  of  John:  A  Historical 
Interpretation.  Chicago:  University  of  Chicago  Press, 
1919. 

TRANSLATIONS 

The  Twentieth  Century  New  Testament:   A  Translation  into 

Modern  English.    New  York:  Revell,  1900. 
Moffatt,  James.     The  New  Testament:  A  New  Translation. 

New  York:  Doran,  19 14. 
Goodspeed,  Edgar  J.     The  Neiv  Testament:  An  American 

Translation.     Chicago:   University  of   Chicago   Press, 

1923. 

Weymouth,  R.  F.  The  New  Testament  in  Modern  Speech. 
Revised  Edition.     Boston:  The  Pilgrim  Press,  1924. 


INDEX 


Abraham,  8,  n,  57,  64. 

Acts,  70. 

Adam,  64. 

Allegorical  interpretation,  90. 

Angel-worship,  42. 

Antioch,  Pisidian,  8. 

Antioch,  Syrian,  9,  50. 

Apollos,  14. 

Apostles,  9,  20. 

Ascetic  practices,  44. 

Barnabas,  50. 

Barnabas,  Epistle  of,  142. 

Beroea,  2. 

Caesarea,  2. 

Christianity     condemned     by 

the  Empire,  95. 
Church  officers,  126. 
Circumcision,  9. 
Clement  of  Rome,  142. 
Collection  for  the  poor,  25,  29. 
Colossae,  41,  42,  43,  47. 
Colossians,  41. 
Corinth,  1,  3,  4,  9,  14,  15,  16, 

20.  33- 

I  Corinthians,  14. 

II  Corinthians,  20. 
Cyprus,  1,  50. 

David,  58,  64. 
Day  of  the  Lord,  5. 
Demetrius,  108. 
Derbe,  8. 


Diotrephes,  108. 
Domitian,  76,  87. 
Docetists,  106,  109,  no,  in, 
121,  132. 

Emperor  worship,  76. 
Enoch,  Book  of,  133. 
Epaphras,  42,  43,  45. 
Epaphroditus,  36,  37,  39. 
Ephesians,  46. 
Ephesus,  14,  21,  23,  83,  114. 
Epictetus,  105. 

Four  Gospels,  61,  139,  141- 
Freedom,  11. 

Gaius,  107. 
Galatia,  8,  10. 
Galatians,  8. 
Greek  Mission,  70,  71. 

Hebrews,  85. 
Herod,  67,  75. 

Iconium,  8. 

Imprisonment  of  Paul,  35,  38. 

Incarnation,  117. 

James,  100,  101. 

Jerusalem,  14,  29,  30,  50,  66; 

fall  of,  56. 
Jesus,  1,  3,  9,  and  often. 
Jewish  Christian  teachers,  8, 

10. 
Jewish  scriptures  accepted,  128. 


H9 


150    The  Story  of  the  New  Testament 


John,  Gospel  of,  114. 
John,  Letters  of,  106. 
John  the  Elder,  112,  122. 
John  the  prophet,  79. 
Jude,  132. 

Kingdom  of  God,  51,  S3,  5$,  66, 

67,  81. 
Kingdom  of  Heaven,  58. 

Laodicea,  42,  45>  47- 
Lord's  Supper,  15,  16,  17. 
Luke,  64,  68,  71. 
Luke,  Gospel  of,  63. 
Lystra,  8. 

Marcion,  139. 
Mark,  49.  5°.  S1- 
Mark,  Gospel  of,  49- 
Matthew,  57. 
Matthew,  Gospel  of,  55. 

Nero's  persecution,  76,  85,  86. 
New  Testament,  140. 

Onesimus,  41,  43>  47« 
Organization,  125. 

Parables,  66,  67,  117. 
Paul,  1,  2,  3,  and  often. 
Peter,  14,  49,  S°,  51- 
I  Peter,  95. 
n  Peter,  132. 
Peter  literature,  134- 
Pharisees  and  Sadducees,  67. 


Philemon,  41,  42,  43.  47- 
Philemon,  Letter  to,  41. 
Philippi,  2,  3,  35. 
Philippians,  35. 
Phoebe,  33,  34- 
Pilate,  67,  75. 
Pliny,  98. 
Position  of  women,  126. 

Return  of  Jesus,  4. 
Revelation  of  John,  83,   126, 

141. 
Righteousness,  31,  58. 
Romans,  28. 
Rome,  2,  28,  29,  31,  41.  49.  8S- 

Samaritan,  68,  119. 
Sermons,  ancient,  100, 
Sermon  on  the  Mount,  58. 
Shepherd  of  Hennas,  143. 
Silvanus,  3. 
Spain,  28,  29,  30. 

Tertius,  12. 
Theophilus,  64. 
Thessalonians,  x. 
Thessalonica,  1,  2,  S- 
Timothy,  3,  9*- 
Timothy,  Letters  to,  126. 
Titus,  12,  23,  24,  25. 
Titus,  Letter  to,  126. 
Tychicus,  44.  47- 

"Word,"  115. 


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